Legends
by Dylan Kennedy
Summary: Roland Deschain has gotten his second chance, and now he's back on his quest to find the Dark Tower. But it seems he's taking new roads this time. Who is the other man in black? Whose fate has been chosen by ka to be part of Roland's new ka-tet?
1. Arc One  Chapter 1

**Author's Note: **This marks the beginning of Arc One: The Gunslinger. As this is a retelling of The Dark Tower series by Stephen King (with some heavy changes to the plot of course), I highly recommend reading the actual book(s) before or after each chapter.

Arc One covers the events in the first book, titled "The Gunslinger". Certain things have been changed or omitted from the plot. Fans of the series will recognize what exactly has been altered right away. For you people new to the series, I hope that you will take my advice and read Stephen King's series in addition to reading my retelling. Thank you again for reading.

* * *

Legends

_The Gunslinger – The Desert_

The man in black fled across the desert, and the gunslinger followed.

Although, that wasn't really correct, now was it? But that shall wait for later…

The sun beat down on the gunslinger with a fury that only million-year old stars know of. He had been walking for a very long time, and his water supply has grown low. _I need to get to a town, _he thought. _How long has it even been since I've seen a real person? _

He remembered buying the mule beside him, but the where and when was uncertain. Time had begun to get a little odd lately, much like a watch whose batteries are preparing to expire. An hour _might _be sixty minutes. It _might _also be seventy-five or forty.

The gunslinger stopped to get a drink from his waterskins. The first of the two was empty, and he polished off the last gulp of the second one. _How comical, _he thought. _I have come thousands of miles just to die of thirst in a god-forsaken desert. Ka can be quite the joker._

He pushed on without further thoughts, for thoughts were for men who had water and time to spend. All Roland had now was his waterskins, his purse (which you may think of as a satchel), a shiny golden horn, and his guns.

Oh yes, there was the guns. Two big revolvers with sandlewood grips on them, oiled and primed for dealing death. The grips each had a small steel plate attached to them to optimize balance for the gunslinger, as he and his father were not of equivelant shape and size. A gunslinger's machines need to be balanced, as the gunslinger himself was the ultimate equilibrium between life and death.

The gunslinger felt dizzy for a moment, keeling over and almost falling on his face. _I musn't fall out here, _he decided. _For if I should fall, I may not have the strength to get back up._

The gunslinger righted himself and felt his belongings. The guns, the purse, and the horn were all there. He felt a little tingle as he touched the horn, in his fingers and even in his mind. He felt as though the horn had perhaps not been there before, but he knew that it had. He had picked up the horn after his friend Cuthbert had finally fallen during the battle on Jericho Hill.

But that was a story for another day.

He pushed on through the desert for two more hours until he came across the remains of a small campfire. _The man in black was here, _he thought. Upon further inspection, he noticed that this campfire was slightly larger than that of the previous ones he had found. _I'm either getting closer or…_ his train of thought slammed to a stop in his mind.

This fire wasn't the only weird thing. On the ground next to the campfire, the sand and rocks had been shifted and moved in a way to make room for not one sleeping body, but _two._ _In all my time chasing Walter, _he thought, for that was the man in black's name, _he has never had a close accomplice on the run with him. If he has an accomplice, why not stop and face me? Surely he would feel confident in his ability to kill me with the aid of another wizard like himself…_

This finding prompted several more uncomfortable questions within the gunslinger's mind. He decided that all would be answered when it was necessary, and that he should make camp. The sun had already begun it's decent below the horizon, and only a half hour of light remained.

The gunslinger set up his tent and laid out his gunna, a collection of all his gear. He merely sat next to the fire for a while, thinking of old friends from a long time ago.

"But the world has moved on since then," he said aloud.

Indeed it had. The world really had moved on, but not for the last time. Unbeknownst to Roland, it was about to happen again.


	2. A1  Chapter 2

_The Men in Black – The Desert_

Two cloaked men sat beside a fire, many miles away from the gunslinger. One was producing a chicken, already feathered and spiced, from the sleeve of his robe. His pale complexion lit up slightly from the light being given off of the flames, giving him a sinister look that might even strike fear into the heart of the Crimson King himself.

The Crimson King, he was the reason for all of this.

"How much longer until he catches up?" asked what we shall consider the _second_ man in black, for he was a new player in this twisted web woven by _ka _itself.

"It will be some time before the gunslinger finds his mark, but by now, I'm sure he's figured out that I am no longer alone."

The first man in black put the chicken he had magicked onto a spit over the fire. The second man in black looked off towards the mountains, then back at a small building a few miles behind them, and then over to the first man in black.

"Are you sure we should have left that boy in that abandoned station back there? He didn't seem entirely normal, I'm sure he could create problems for us somewhere down the line…"

The first man in black cut in immediately, "It's not like you, _winged_ one, to be worried, especially about something as trifle as a young boy, barely in his adolescence at best."

"I have no fear, especially no fear of _you._" The second man in black drew his sword, which happened to be a disturbingly long katana.

The first man in black looked up at his "companion", threw back his head, and bellowed laughter to the stars. "Oh please, you'll never have your revenge if you kill me. Only I know the location of the one who defied you not once, but _twice_, and took away your life both times. You've come all the way here to kill him and take his power, and what a pity it would be to throw it all away over your own insecurities."

The second man in black merely stared, his eyes ablaze with all the fury and hatred of a thousand damned souls. _He is right, so he shall live, for now… _thought the second man in black.

_For now…_


	3. A1  Chapter 3

_The Gunslinger – The Desert_

The gunslinger slept dreamlessly that night. He awoke early the next day, his body alive with anticipation. _I am closer now than I ever was, _he thought. He kicked the ash remains of his fire and continued onward toward the mountains.

He had been walking for a few hours before noticing a hut off in the distance, a speck of reddish clay standing out against the ever-present sand and rock of the desert. He reached it by midday and found himself looking at a real person.

The person was a man, tall but not giant. He had a red robe on with one arm tucked inside of it, using the sleeve as a mock-sling. On the man's belt were a few pouches and a glazed jug. The gunslinger wondered what exactly was inside that jug, and decided it was probably _not _water or tea.

The sun glimmered off of the robed man's sunglasses as the gunslinger approached him. The gunslinger was about to say his greetings when he noticed a very large sword propped up against the wall beside the robed man.

"Life for your crop," the gunslinger finally spoke after a stare-down and awkward silence.

"Life for your own," replied the robed man.

They merely stood there looking at each other for a few seconds before both men finally extended their hands and shook. They went into the hut and shared some food.

The gunslinger found out that the man's name was Auron and that he was extremely strange. He had appeared to come from a place that was very far away, but the gunslinger guessed that wasn't the _whole _truth (and nothing but the truth so help me god).

Auron leaned back, at length, and drew deep from his jug. The gunslinger smelled liquor, but of an unknown variety to him. _It's no ale or graff, but almost like tea, _he thought.

"There's a well out back if you're thirsty," said Auron. "But before you go, I'm supposed to answer some questions for you."

The gunslinger found this last statement quite odd.

"I'm sure that you're finding this quite odd, gunslinger, but you're well aware of the hands of ka. This is your story, and I'm here to fill in some plot holes. Now listen to me, and listen to me very well…"

Auron told the gunslinger that this would be his "final story", but when asked of the significance he only said, "It is not my place to explain everything, gunslinger. Only to tell." Auron told him that he was indeed gaining distance on the man he had been pursuing for so long, and that there was another party at play in the events to come. The gunslinger's eyes flickered upon hearing this.

"Know this, gunslinger: although you are indeed a machine capable of dealing death and destruction with skill and precision, you are not prepared for the other man in black. He is from another world entirely and the odds of you beating him and the other man in black by yourself are close to none."

The gunslinger merely looked at Auron, attempting to hide any emotions that might show on his face.

"But fear not," Auron assured. "You won't be alone. Up ahead there is a ruined building. In this building is an ally of great use to you, although he will never learn the ways of the gun. This time, Roland Deschain, you really are the last gunslinger."

Roland rested his right hand on the butt of one of his guns. He felt the sandlewood grip with his fingers and confided in the steel of his deathmachine. Roland looked up to ask Auron a question, but Auron was gone. All that remained where he once sat was a bag full of dried jerky and a note.

_ Gunslinger, _

_ While you are with the boy, the men in black travel with your soul in their pockets._

_ But fear not, for they underestimate the power of your ka-tet._

_ -Auron_

_P.S.- This is not the last time we shall meet. Remember, gunslinger, all roads lead to the Tower._

The gunslinger looked out the door and was not surprised to see that it was already nighttime. He laid out his gunna once more and came to rest.

He had one last thought that night before drifting off into a nightmare-filled craze:

_All roads lead to the Dark Tower_.


	4. A1  Chapter 4

_The Gunslinger – Dive_

The gunslinger found himself standing in the waters of a far-away place he once knew as "The Clean Sea". Over yonder, he could see steep cliffs where packs of horses ran and cropped freely. The Drop is what that wonderful place was called.

_Roland, come to me…_

The gunslinger looked toward the beach and saw her standing there. The girl in the window, the one with beautiful blonde hair that blazed in the sunlight waved her arms about and called out to him. He smiled, suddenly looking many years younger. The creases of stress and battle momentarily retreated from his hardened face as he ran towards her. She ran to him too, and as they were about to meet, the gunslinger fell.

_I love thee Roland…_

Roland fell deep down into the water. But soon, the water faded to blackness. Pure black, with daunting little stars of light here and there. He fell down into himself on his back, when he felt the entire world shift sideways. He was now upright, as if standing.

His decent slowed, then ceased as he came to rest standing on an enormous pillar topped with stained glass decoration. The pillar was circular, and in the middle of the decoration lie the Dark Tower, surrounded by roses. There were little circles around the edge of the decoration, each a different brilliant color. One of these circles was pink, and it glowed brighter than the rest.

The gunslinger looked around in wonder, not understanding any of this. _This is more than a dream I fear… _he thought. He suddenly felt danger and dipped to his guns, which luckily, were still there.

_Walk towards the circle…can you do it?_

Roland didn't respond to the voice, something in him just _knew _it wouldn't respond to his questions or comments. He walked toward the circle and was not at all surprised when a glass staircase appeared under him. The staircase wound up in a spiral toward another pillar. He mounted the steps and began climbing, feeling a brief touch of nostalgia.

When he reached the top, the staircase behind him disappeared and he was left on top of another stained glass decoration. This one was split into three triangles of a brilliant yellow. A face was behind the triangles of a young boy, blonde, and dressed in a tunic as green as the forests. Roland knew not the significance of this, yet.

_The darkness is coming, gunslinger. Soon, you will not be alone, but for now, you shall fight as you are. They come…_

He resented that the voice borrowed the voice of the girl at the window. Susan Delgado was her name, his first love. He was about to lapse into memories when the first of _they _appeared.

Black. Insectile, complete with antennas. Two glowing yellow eyes stared up from the jerkety thing.

The gunslinger saw it's claws and wasted no time blowing it to pieces. The creature couldn't have even seen his hands move, for they were _gunslinger's _hands. Roland's hands had dealt more than their fair share of death, and they moved with spectral speed whenever the red mist of battle flowed into his mind. He felt that familiar coldness, that emptiness flood his mind as more of the black things appeared.

_They come for your heart gunslinger. If you'd keep it, you'll kill…_

No arguments from the gunslinger floated up. His hands blurred more, explosions of gunfire rocking out in the darkness. The insects exploded one after another as they marched toward the gunslinger.

_Kill. Kill. Kill._

The voice began chanting louder and louder as he ran out of ammo. His fingers swapped motions and began their reloading trick, dancing back and forth from his criss-crossed gunbelts toward his revolvers. The cylinders filled as the last insect approached him. Roland bothered not with his gun, he merely kicked the thing off of the pillar he now stood on.

_The heartless are coming for you, Roland. The darkness of the Tower calls to them, and to you, for you are the key._

_Key. Key. Key._

The gunslinger groaned as the voice continued it's chanting. He was starting to wonder if there was any significance behind all this madness when the decoration beneath him changed. He was confused at it's new image. He saw the man from the desert resting upon a bluff with another blonde-haired lad (but not the one from the previous image) sat next to him. A sword of odd shape, a staff of magical power, and some sort of sports ball lay in the dirt next to the two of them.

_These two, gunslinger, are the ferrymen from another land. Only they can guide you across the rifts to the Dark Tower. Your final story begins now._

The gunslinger screamed, "WHAT STORY, CURSED VOICE OF MY SUSAN THAT WAS? WHAT DOES THEE SPEAK OF?"

_Shh! Your darkness approaches. I hope you're ready…_

The gunslinger suddenly fell from where he stood. He hit the floor of another pillar far below him, groaning with pain. The image that adorned this pillar was of three men. One was the boy in the tunic, another of a spikey-haired blonde man with a sword nearly as big as himself, and the third of a silvery-haired man in baron's clothes.

Roland got to his feet, guns in hand. He looked forward and saw a pool of darkness on the ground, morphing and pulsing. The darkness picked itself up and became the man in black, but not the right one. This one was the _other _man in black. The winged one.

The man in black approached Roland, unphased by the bullets that tore into him. Roland stopped firing after his fourth shot refused to drop it's target.

"You carry more darkness in you than Cloud, and that's remarkable."

Roland felt something deep inside of him burn with pain and fury. He struck out at the man in black, but only grasped smoke. The man in black had vanished, but his voice called down from the heavens, "I'll be meeting you soon, gunslinger. And when I do, your soul will be mine. Your darkness calls to me, and to _them._" More of the insects appeared.

"Those without hearts. They are the heartless, and they're coming for you."

Roland felt himself being split in half at the spine. He screamed and wailed with pain as a dark mirror of himself literally tore it's being from Roland's body. The gunslinger finally pulled away and staggered back as his doppelganger rose. The gunslinger fired a single shot at it before being knocked off the platform by the heartless.


	5. A1  Chapter 5

**AN: **This is the point where my story begins to heavily differ from Stephen King's original plot. I can't say exactly why and how, but you'll find out if you read.

Let's just say that the companion I've chosen for Roland is a little different than the character King used. I think you'll recognize him, and I'm sure you'll love him. Thanks again for reading.

* * *

_The Gunslinger – The Desert_

Roland came back to consciousness with guns in hand, screaming. He thought he could still feel the wind on his body as if he really was just falling from atop a giant pillar and his dreams had been, in fact, a reality.

Daylight had just begun to break over the desert at this time, adding further to the surreal factor that was bombarding the gunslinger's mind. He wasted no time packing up his _gunna _and moving on.

He ran out of water by noon. The last drink had been taken as he set out that morning, and it seemed the sun was especially brutal that day. He used every inch and ounce of his willpower to keep moving, to keep from falling.

An hour later, the gunslinger's will ran out. For the second time in twenty-four hours, the gunslinger fell.

* * *

He awoke to the smell of hay and…

And forest?

He felt a certain coolness on his face and lips – water. The gunslinger groped around madly, finding a cup of water. Instead of chugging it ferociously as he desired, he took small drinks to keep from getting sick. He sat up as he drank, now noticing the apparent source of forest smell: there was a boy sitting against the opposite wall, watching him with a sincere smile and bright eyes. The boy wore a tunic as green as the forests and an aura of pure goodness.

A thought roared across the great plains that were the gunslinger's mind: _He's the boy. The one from the stained glass pictures, and probably the one Auron spoke of._ Another thought followed along behind it, but much fainter and the gunslinger barely registered the thought: _He's not so different from the one you dropped. Not at all._

"Hi, I'm the one that brought you inside. For a while there, I was pretty sure you died. Honestly, this isn't the strangest thing that's happened today," the boy said, still grinning. The gunslinger now noticed an ornate shield and sword sitting propped against the wall next to the blonde, blue-eyed boy in front of him. _What's with the swordsmen lately? It's as though Arthur Eld has wound back the clocks with his own gauntleted-hand… _Roland thought.

"Where do you come from, boy?" he croaked before taking another sip of water. The cup ran dry.

"There's more water in the pump-thingy over there, that's where I got it. I'm from Hyrule, but I just came from a place called Termina. Man, that was a weird trip."

Roland combed his brain for "Hyrule" and "Termina" but came up with nothing. He continued his inquires:

"How did you end up here, in this place?" he asked, then added, "and thank-ee for the water, young swordsman."

The boy got up and paced back and forth for a little bit, seeming to have a hard time figuring out how he did get to be in the desert. "Well," he started. "I was leaving Termina and I was meaning to head back home, I've had quite enough adventuring for the last two years to last me seven lifetimes, when…something happened. I must have gotten off Epona -she's my horse- otherwise she'd be here too. I really can't remember the rest."

The boy sat back down in his spot, trying more to remember recent events. Roland drew one of his guns, this raised an eyebrow of the boy, and flipped open the chamber. He took out a single bullet and closed the chamber.

"Listen boy, I'd like to-"

"Please don't call me boy. You wouldn't believe the kind of things I've done lately, and I honestly don't feel much like a kid anymore."

"Then what shall I call you?"

"Link. My name is Link." The boy beamed. "What's yours?"

"Roland, son of Steven Deschain that was."

Link laughed heartily. "You talk funny, Roland. Alright, what do you want to do?"

The gunslinger danced the bullet back and forth across his knuckles, in a fast-rhythmic motion. Link began to concentrate on the bullet as it sped back and forth. "That's a cool trick…" he murmured before he seemed to fall asleep. The gunslinger kept moving the shell, but decided the boy was under enough to began tracing his steps.

"Link, do you hear me?"

"I hear you Roland, son of Steven."

"That's good, Link," the gunslinger responded. "How did you come to be in this place?"

Link's face remained blank and expressionless, much like his voice. "I was riding home through the Lost Woods when I came across a huge black and golden wall that pulsed and wavered. I dismounted my horse because she was scared of the wall, then I went up to investigate. A huge hand came out of the wall and pulled me in. The rest is a mist."

The gunslinger thought about what he just heard for a few seconds, coming to the simple conclusion of: _Thinny. He was pulled into a thinny and into my word. But the question is, how far away is his world? Can he keep up?_

"Alright Link, you've done good. I'm going to snap my fingers and you're going to remember everything, do you understand?"

"Yes."

The gunslinger snapped his fingers and Link's eyes opened wide. He merely sat there for a few moments, blinking heavily, before strapping his sword and shield onto his back. He paced about the room more before hearing Roland's stomach grumble and complain as if to say, "I don't care much for these stories, put some food in me right now or I shall make life far more difficult than it needs to be."

The boy and the gunslinger shared dried beef and pump-water. They stayed there in the shack that night. But neither of them would sleep very much.

The heartless came for them both as they slept. Roland heard them first, waking up from dreamless sleep, senses screaming. The sound of scratching on the walls woke him, and the boy began to stir as Roland drew his guns. He turned on the light just as one of the shadows began to converge on the boy.

Roland blew the heartless to pieces, just as he'd done in his dream. Link was on his feet in a flash, sword and shield drawn with that same spooky speed that was in the gunslinger's own hands. The boy screamed a cry of battle before leaping upon another one of the heatless, cleaving it in half vertically. Roland's guns thundered three more times, taking three more heartless down with cold ease. The wave of battle washed over both of them as Link's sword flew and Roland's guns jammed their elegy of bloodshed. Roland's guns ran empty as the last heartless was shot and cleaved simultaneously.

The two of them looked at each other, now realizing that the battle had been won. Roland reloaded quickly and Link began to rummage through a satchel on his side. He produced a small purple magnifying glass with a cat's eye in the middle of the lens. He looked through it all around the room as the gunslinger stood up and began packing his gear. The sun's rays had yet to breach the horizon line, but it would be soon enough. As he was finishing, a nasty groan came from the cellar door in the corner.

Link wheeled around, sword and shield drawn again. Roland drew one of his guns and handed Link the torch on the wall. "Carry this and follow behind me, but not too close. I'll need a step's worth of room if we run into more trouble."

The boy sheathed his weapon, took the torch, and nodded. The two of them descended the steps into the dark, damp cellar below. The small of long-neglected vegetables crept up their noses, watering their eyes and dampening their spirits. The voice from earlier whined once more, this time making words, "Roland, son of Steven. Come to me and receive my wisdom!"

The boy pulled out the magnifying glass again with his free hand. He looked around before pointing over to the eastern wall. "There's something up with that miscolored brick over there."

The gunslinger silently thanked himself for the boy and his odd device as he punched a hole in the bricks. Link shuddered and braced himself, but the gunslinger remained unharmed. He found something in the wall, grabbed it, and pulled out his arm to see that he was clutching a jawbone in his hand. He tucked it into his back pocket and they both headed out of the cellar into the dawn's first light.

They walked far that day, talking little. The boy carried one of Roland's waterskins with him without complaint. It seemed as though the boy had been used to adventure and the carrying of gear that often accompanies such.

Roland stopped just as they reached the edge of the desert, and the foothills that lay at it's edge. "I'm looking for someone, and have been for quite some time, Link. If you look over to the mountains, you'll see him and his new friend."

Indeed you could see them. The men in black were but two small specks, moving up the massive mountain that lay miles ahead of them. "Are you up for some mountains, Link?" the gunslinger asked.

"Honestly, the mountains and the forest are elements quite familiar to me. I've never been fond of deserts, but at least I wasn't following some damn ghost through a duststorm in that last one."

Roland didn't understand what the boy had said, but asked nothing of it. They continued on into the foothills, Roland focusing his eyes on the men in black as they climbed.


	6. A1  Chapter 6

**AN: **In this chapter, Roland tells one of his stories about his childhood in Gilead. For the most part, I will be omitting most of these from the plot. However, the ones I feel are necessary to include have been re-written rather lightly. I hope you understand that I have no intention of just copying Mr. King.

If you want to read the full original story of Hax the Cook, go read "The Gunslinger" by Stephen King. Thanks again for reading.

* * *

_The Gunslinger and The Boy – The Mountains_

It took them two days to clear the foothills and enter the mountains. The crisp air was a relief to breathe after the baked horrors of the desert. They'd been living on a diet of rabbits and berries for a few days and both of them desperately wanted some bigger game.

It was Link who took it down.

Link, coming from Hyrule, had no idea what a bear was. He was out in the brush with the Hero's Bow, a gift from his adventures in Termina, when he saw a fine doe. This was the first doe he had seen without extra limbs or guts hanging out on the outside of it's body. No mutie, this was. This was fine threaded stock, as people in Roland's world called it.

He drew back an arrow and looked at his target. The doe looked back at him, their eyes locked in the delicate embrace of life and death. The doe moved it's head and ran off into the wilderness as a thunderous roar erupted in the brush behind Link.

The boy slowly turned around with the arrow still drawn to see a grizzly bear towering over him on it's hind legs – the stance of warning. Link let fly with his first arrow into the bear's heart and began running back to camp screaming.

"_ROLLLLAANNDDDD! WHAT THE HELL IS THIS THING?"_

He kept running, the bear gaining on him with every half-second. The bear made a mad swipe, knocking the boy sprawling. Link drew and let fly with another arrow, this one bouncing harmlessly off of the bear's thick skull.

The bear leaned back and prepared to maul this puny human to death before thunder filled the air. Roland's hands were ablaze with speed, his guns playing their elegy at top-volume. The bear's face opened up as multiple bullets tore into it, driving it back onto it's hind. Link jumped to his feet, drawing his sword and shield. He raised the sword above his head screaming, "HYAAAAGHH!" as he leapt forward, bringing the blade down onto the bear's middle, slicing him in half. The bear gurgled and died as his innards and blood sprayed all over the boy. What was once a green tunic was now crimson.

The gunslinger looked at the boy as he huffed and caught his breath, standing over his kill. The gunslinger's eyes were filled with pride, and something else.

_No. Do not get attached._

But it was too late for that. Roland admired the boy's enormous will to fight and survive, his prowess in battle was astounding for anyone, let alone a boy of eleven. That was the spark that would lead to the burning fire of fatherly love he would eventually have for the boy.

They dined on bear that night. Link was munching on a particularly rare steak, he apparently liked them that way, when he finally broke the victorious silence. "Tell me a story, Roland."

The gunslinger sucked in air through his teeth and exhaled loudly. He was waiting for the boy to ask him such a question, but now that it was asked, he couldn't think of a story to tell.

"I've got many stories to tell, Link. Would you hear of my childhood in my home of Gilead?"

The boy beamed, a topic that he could possibly identify with. "That sounds awesome! Tell me what _you _did when you were my age. I bet _you _didn't travel back and forth through time multiple times, fighting ghosts and zombies and thieves and pretty much every monster that lurked in your nightmares."

The gunslinger was taken aback. He hoped that the boy was spinning tales and not being truthful about his childhood. _Because if he's telling the truth, I've honestly got nothing on him, _thought the gunslinger.

"Well there was some magic, here and there, but no time travel."

* * *

It was a day much like any other. Roland and his close friend Cuthbert, a joker to the core, were released from their day's training early.

Cort had been especially hard on poor Cuthbert that day. "It's important to see, maggots," Cort had said. "Because if you can't see, then you don't know what you're looking at."

Cuthbert had taken this nugget of wisdom at face value, saying "Oh really? I figured that if you couldn't see, you were just shit out of luck, dear teacher of mine!"

Cort had wound back and slammed the back of his fist across Cuthbert's face, knocking him to the ground and breaking the joker's nose. Blood oozed and Cuthbert looked up at him with hurt, fiery eyes.

There was something in those eyes that Cort had been waiting to see, and now it saw it. Hate. Pure hatred.

"There's your true face, maggot. Come to me when you think you can best me, but until then, shut your ever-fucking gob and show me respect. You need to see with your _mind's _eye. We'll talk more of this tomorrow. Get the fuck out of my vicinity before I break other things on your body."

He turned to Roland. "You too, and I suggest you convince your friend to get smart before he gets crippled."

Roland helped Cuthbert to his feet, then the boys slinked away toward the kitchen. They were close friends with the kitchen's head chef, Hax. Hax was a deeply tanned, tall man who saw children differently than Cort. Hax often offered them small treats, hurrying them on their way afterwards.

Hax saw Cuthbert's face and frowned deeply. He grabbed two pieces of blueberry pie from the counter, dodging a cookboy as he flew through the doors. Gilead's kitchen was especially busy on this day, it seemed.

"Hurry up and eat your pie now, boys. Go along once you're finished, and for gods sakes, don't get me into trouble, eh?"

Hax left them with a wink as a shady, robed man approached. The two boys ducked into the pantry as Hax walked into the next room with the man. The pantry had a knot-hole, so they spied on the following conversation.

"You know I could get killed for this, don't you?" Hax pleaded.

"That doesn't matter to me, nor the Good Man. Besides, you're not strangling them with your bare hands, are ye? Nay. You're just slipping some poison in their food. You know the Good Man can't have these kiddies growing up into gunslingers, now can he? Do your job, nothing more.

"Poison." The boys whispered to each other simultaneously. They snuck out of the kitchen and into the courtyard.

_Don't get me into trouble, eh?_

That was what Hax had said. But could they be silent? Hax was poisoning the children.

They told Cort.

The next day, Hax was tried and convicted of High Treason, the punishment would be death by hanging.

Cort gave Cuthbert a loaf of bread an hour before the execution, instructing him and Roland to spread crumbs at the feet of the hanged man.

Cuthbert and Roland showed up to the Gallows early, looking around at the place where their friend would die. Hax the cook, the one who had always given children treats after a day's worth of beatings and lessons. Hax the cook who had said to the two boys _Don't get me into trouble, eh?_

"I want to watch it, Roland." Cuthbert said to his friend. Roland and Cuthbert were both years before they'd earn their guns, before the girl at the window, before many of their life's difficulties.

"I do too, Bert. But something about it just feels…wrong. Even if Hax was going to poison everyone, I can't help but feel some remorse for him. Pity, even."

The boys stood there, staring at the Gallows as people began to show up for the hanging. Eventually, Hax was brought out by a gunslinger and two judges. He had a black sack that remained over his head until he was in the noose and standing over the small hatch that would end him.

The gunslinger read his charges out loud and removed the sack, asking for last words. Hax spoke, his voice carrying through the tense air, "I have never forgotten the face of my father, he has been with me throughout."

The gunslinger, whose name was Charles, son of Charles spoke, "I, Charles son of Charles, declare that you have crossed The White, and I consign you ever to the Black."

The crowd murmured unpleasantly. "Are you there Roland?" Cuthbert whispered to his friend. Roland nodded and took Bert's hand as young boys often do to comfort one another in times such as these.

"I never-" Hax began to say before he was cut off by the executioner.

"Tell your tale to the underworld, maggot." said Charles son of Charles as he pulled the lever and dropped Hax to his fate.

The boys waited until the crowd left before approaching the body the hung in the stilled air before them. They looked at each other, both pale as ghosts, nodded, and did the deed they were bid to do. They spread the crumbs, turned around, and walked home without looking back.

* * *

The gunslinger sighed heavily as he finished his tale. It was late now, and his body begged for rest. Link was still looking at him, eyes full of curiosity and something else as well.

_He can relate to this, _thought Roland. _He understands what it's like to be a child in a dangerous world._

Link broke his stare, looked into the fire, and poked one of the burning logs with a stick. He drew his weapons, after a bit, and layed his sword in his lap.

Roland now took the moment to look over the sword. It was a longsword, ornate and expertly crafted. The blade bore alternating triangles of golden metal and steel. The guard forked out in a wide "W", and the pommel of the sword had a jewel in it. This sword would be worth quite a bit of money if sold to the right person.

"This sword has been with me since the beginning, although it's appearance has changed quite a bit. When I first took it from the hollow of my home, the Kokiri Forest, it was short and simple. After refining it twice in Termina, it has now become the Guilded Sword, forged from the Razor Sword. I will never use one of your guns, Roland, but the way of the Sword has kept me alive and I entrust my faith in it."

Neither of them spoke for awhile. Roland could tell that Link was trying to figure out how to say something, and he knew what it was.

"Link, when you feel you are ready to tell me about your adventures, I will listen. Let it go for tonight, rest well, and reflect on it as we travel. Will you do this for me?"

Link looked up at him. His blue eyes shined brightly with the reflections of the fire. "I will, Roland. Thanks for understanding."

Link tucked away his weapons and rolled over, dozing off. The gunslinger allowed a smile to touch the corners of his mouth before he too finally rolled over and slept.

_While you are with the boy, the men in black travel with your soul in their pockets, _Auron had said. The gunslinger heard his voice again as he lapsed into sleep:

"This is your final story. Make it right, and I'll be seeing you again, gunslinger."


	7. A1  Chapter 7

_The Gunslinger and The Boy – The Mountains_

Roland awoke from his dreamless sleep, senses flaring with that feeling of utter wrongness. He checked his body for wounds, checked his guns, and it took him a second to figure it out.

Link was gone.

The gunslinger had sensed it as they came to their campsite, a sensation of burning lust and anxiousness. There was an oracle nearby, a demon that feeds on sex and offers information to travelers willing to partake in intercourse. Unfortunately, the will and sexual energy of an oracle was so strong, it was actually capable of _fucking _someone to death.

Link was an 11-year-old boy. He stood no chance.

Roland was on his feet, tearing through the forest toward the place where the aura of lust burned deep. He burst through the brush into a clearing where a circle of large rocks lay. Link was down on his knees in the circle, swaying back and forth.

Without thinking, for this was the way the gunslinger acted best, Roland ran into the circle holding out the jawbone and screaming.

"_DEMON OF THE CIRCLE! YOU WILL RETREAT AND SPARE THIS BOY!"_

Roland felt something strong retreat back away from him, but the aura of lust was getting more and more hostile by the second. Roland picked up the boy, slung him over his shoulder, and ran out of the circle back to camp.

He set the boy back down on his sleeping mat and sat by the fire, staring into the burning coals. It was a while before dawn, yet, and if he tried he might just get a wee more sleep.

He put the jawbone in the hands of the boy and drifted back into slumber.

When he awoke the next day, Link was already awake by the fire. He had a look of shame and fear written upon his face. His big blue eyes showed it the most, however, especially in stark contrast to the icy cold blue of the gunslinger's eyes. A man once called them "bombardier's eyes", and I think you'd find the description quite apt.

"I slept-walked last night, didn't I?"

The gunslinger patted the boy on the shoulder and began to roll up his gear. "You did indeed, but don't feel bad. Many stronger souls have fallen prey to oracles. They prey on sexuality, and you're young and full of life. You were a perfect target."

The gunslinger could see that this was perhaps not the best direction for calming the boy, but he continued.

"Anyways, I'll be gone for a little while. I need you to stay here and watch our things."

Link shot him a suspicious look. "Are you going to the circle?"

"Yes, I need information. I'll be okay, I've got something to help me out." Roland procured a small pill from his purse.

Now, dear reader of mine, I'm sure you're about to make harsh judgments on Roland for having a purse, but I suggest you don't. In Roland's world, a "purse" is what you or I might call a "satchel" or perhaps even something similar to a "bookbag". So fear not, Roland is not of the feminine David-Bowie variety. With that said, let's move on.

Roland held the pill out before him. "I've forgotten the name of this, but I remember what it does. It relaxes the mind and muscles, easing the pain of the task I'm about to tackle. Keep that jawbone close, and be safe. I know you can handle yourself."

Roland took the pill, chased it with water from one of his skins, and started back toward the circle. Link's face was full of pride and joy, birds sang, and life seemed to suck a whole lot less for the moment.

In the speaking-circle, things changed. As soon as Roland entered, he felt the embrace of that lustful aura. A light breeze, quickly becoming soothing and warm. The pill had begun to work by now, and he felt ready and at ease.

"Demon of the circle," he started before he was cut off.

"_No please, don't call me something nasty like that. I could love you forever, Roland."_

"Shut up, ye bitch of the winds. I need to know certain things."

"_Information costs things, Roland of Gilead. Open yourself to me and I shall do the same for you."_

"No, star-slut. You tell me things, and if I find it useful, then you'll get it."

The aura seemed to relax a little, accepting the deal. _"Very well, Roland of Gilead. I shall tell for you your fortune. Listen well. This journey is to be your last, the man named Auron told you this much. The choices you make are vital, for the Tower is far worse than it has ever been. The wheel of _ka _grows tired of spinning backward for you, Roland of Gilead."_

Roland let the information sink in as he waited for the speaking-demon to continue.

"_Now, soon enough you shall draw three souls to aid you on your quest. The first of these is infested with a demon. The name of this demon is MAKO."_

Roland has never heard of this "MAKO" before. He considered asking the demon what it was, but chose to remain silent instead.

"_The second of your three is only half-human. He's a mystery to many, but a valuable ally, nonetheless. He thrives under The Moon._

_The last of your three is already with you. The boy, the time-traveller, the one called "The Hero of Time" in his own lands. He's a fierce warrior, perhaps as fearless as yourself. He has the power of three Goddesses stored inside of him. But know this, he has many incarnations, and you will meet more than one of them on your quest."_

"You speak in riddles, but you've told me enough. Have at me, bitch."

Roland walked back to the campsite, throbbing and sullen. He felt dirty, used, and soiled. Roland and Link continued on their trek not long after his return, giving the speaking-circle a very wide berth.

They walked on for a week and a half, going through intense forest and walking across tall cliffs before finally catching up to the men in black.

They came to the entrance of what seemed to be a cave, or perhaps even a tunnel. Roland saw both men in black as they prepared to enter the tunnel, firing off three shots which seemed to miss the men in black entirely.

"I don't think so, Roland! That's not the way we'll play this little game," said the first man in black.

"Your weapons are useless, now die," said the second. He was about to draw his sword when Link let fly with an arrow, narrowly missing the head of the first man in black. The first man in black let out a shriek, then the both of them disappeared into the tunnel.

Roland and Link ran in after them, but they were gone. Except that Roland knew they weren't. They were far ahead, aye, but not gone.

"Why couldn't you hit them, Roland? I've seen you shoot before. _You never miss._"

"The one I shot at, his name is Walter, he is a wizard. He must be using some magical barrier that prevents weapons from my world from hurting both of them. But you, you've got things they can't protect against. Let's go catch them, Link."

They pushed on into the darkness of the tunnel.


	8. A1  Chapter 8

**AN: **Someday, when people actually read this chapter, I'm sure I'll get a flood of mad mail. Not hate, just pure mad.

* * *

_The Gunslinger and The Boy – Tunnel_

Tell me reader, what is the longest time you've gone without seeing daylight? Perhaps a day at most when Cataclysm came out, right?

Well you don't have shit on Roland Deschain and Link.

The tunnel was expansive, to say the least, and not a single ray of sunlight blessed it's massive stretch. The only light in the tunnel came from phosphorescent mold growing on the walls and on the ground.

The only thing to keep them on a steady path was the tracks. Tracks that a train of some sort once rain on, tracks that were old and beaten, tracks that showed them the way out of the darkness.

Not much happened in the many days it took for the two to walk to the shopping mall, so I won't waste your time.

When they finally did reach the mall, Link was overwhelmed with joy. To finally see anything besides tracks and dirt was enough to set the adventuring spirit in him ablaze.

"Look! Something other than mold and tracks!" the boy screamed down the tunnel. He secretly hoped whatever foul creator who crafted the tunnels was listening.

Link and Roland walked a little faster, now noticing how they were able to see the shopping area from so far away.

A few electric lights still burned, some flickered. Gotta love those fluorescent lights, eh?

They walked up the steps leading them away from the tracks and to what was once a subway-side shopping center. A few dusty corpses could be seen in the shops and on the ground. Their skin had long deteriorated, all that was left were scraps of clothes and skeletons. One skeleton sat on a bench reading a newspaper. The newspaper crumbled to dust upon Roland's touch.

"What happened here, Roland?" Link looked at the desolation with a look that was almost pity. Not the first time he'd seen long-dead bodies and areas of utter desolation. Afterall, he'd been through the Shadow Temple _and _the Ikana Kingdom. The boy had seen, and fought, enough corpses to last several lifetimes.

"My teacher, not Cort, told me that the Old People killed each other en masse with a virus of some sort. I think that's what we see here. These bodies are ancient, it wouldn't be any sort of stretch to say they are multiple centuries old."

They continued searching the mall, even finding a gunshop. The gunslinger got extremely excited when he saw the letters above the shop. It was some ancient root of the High Speech, but he could make out all the mattered: "GUNS".

They went into the shop and were welcomed with the cold arms of disappointment. Most of the guns have had lead put in their barrels, the others were trash and unusable. The gunslinger did, however, manage to find some ammunition that he hoped still worked. Some of the shells were stained with a sort of dark red hue, as if they'd been bathed in blood. He made mental notes to never fire these shells, and stored them deep within his purse.

They returned to the tracks after some time, mostly disappointed in the trip. Link gave one last look at the abundance of light with something akin to hunger showing on his face before turning around and walking with the gunslinger back into the darkness.

In less than an hour, they found the cart. Both of them were extremely confused by it, not understanding how it worked or what it was for. They both climbed aboard and looked at the odd lever-contraption before them. Link was the first to touch the handle, on his side, and drew his sword upon hearing the cart talk.

"_HOWDY PARTNER! PULL THE HANDLE DOWN!"_

Link replaced his weapons and stared at the handle. He pulled it down, with minor difficulty, and felt the cart move a little forward.

"_GOOD! NOW YOU, ON THE OTHER SIDE, DO THE SAME! YOU CAN DO IT!"_

Roland felt that the voice was far too cheerful, but he obeyed all the same. The cart moved forward again. The two of them put the pieces together at nearly the same time. They both began alternating pulling the handle down, and soon enough, the cart began to speed along the track. All the while the voice continued it's infernal blathering.

"_GOOD! NOW PULL! GOOD! PULL! GOOD! SHOP AT MIGHTY MICKS! DELICIOUS TREATS FOR EVERYONE! PULL!"_

"Can you shut your mouth, or whatever it is you use to talk?" sighed Roland.

"_OF COURSE I CAN! JUST SAY 'HOWDY' WHEN YOU NEED ME AGAIN! REMEMBER, GO TO NORTH CENTRAL POSITRONICS FOR ALL YOUR TECHNOLOGICAL NEEDS!"_

With the voice finally silenced, the two of them pushed the cart along with ease and peace.

* * *

Time had no meaning in the darkness. Pull, pull, sleep, pull, eat meager scraps of dried meat, pull. Roland and Link almost wished for something to happen, even if it was dangerous.

And who am I to deny them?

They saw the first one crawling from the river which had begun to appear alongside the tracks. The source must be beneath the ground, because the river literally _did _appear out of nowhere alongside them.

The thing was perhaps once human, but years of gradual genetic malfunction and radiation morphed it into something hideous. Green eyes, rotten teeth, a mouth which drooled green phosphorescent fluid.

"Roland…" Link began, feeling slightly afraid despite his years of fighting far worse creatures.

"Slow mutants. They might leave us alone. All the same, I'd like for you to ready your bow."

Link blinked several times at Roland. "Do you honestly think I can hit anything in this darkness?"

Roland looked dead-on at the boy, his bombardier's eyes blazing. "Yes."

Roland was clearly a man of many words. Link shrugged, pulled his bow, and readied an arrow. They came across several more slow mutants, and it was not long before the mutants began to make a move.

The first one made the mistake of reaching for the gunslinger. Link's arrow took it right between the eyes, opening up a third. The wound bled glowing green blood, and the mutant fell in the dust. The next mutant grabbed Link's foot as he drew his arrow. Roland heard his scream and shot the mutant in the head before he could pull the boy off of the cart.

The cart was slowing now that neither of them were pulling. Roland knew this meant doom, even as he shot two more mutants in the face. "Link, I need you to pull. If you pull down and push up, you can move the cart on your own. I'll hold them off."

Link wasted no time hesitating. He put away his bow into his shrink-bag and grabbed the handle. Roland's guns continued to issue out death, bright explosions of light erupting with each shot. Both the gunslinger and the boy's eyes were stained with the flashes, but they both kept on with their duties. Rolands fingers danced back and forth between his belts and his guns, reloading, firing, reloading, the cycle continues.

They got out of the hive of slow mutants with tired arms and lighter ammunition bags, but at least they were alive.

They ran out of food as soon as they saw the first tendrils of light stretching into the cave. Good thing too, if not for the light they would have never seen the cliffs.

They stopped the cart a little ways before the edge, marveling at how easily they could have died. The tracks continued on toward the exit, but the supports had rusted heavily and they would have surely collapsed under the weight of the cart.

They both knew they had to do something dangerous. They had to walk on the tracks, the creaky cross-boards and rails, all the way to the exit. The light was stronger than it was before they reached the cliff, but any dance with this beast could be dangerous.

They simply nodded at each other and began to carefully walk on the tracks. Every here and there, there'd be an absence of cross-boards, forcing them to literally walk on the parallel strips of metal that made the outside of the rails. Once, Roland's foot slipped slightly, but he caught himself before this story could end prematurely.

They were within feet of the exit when the men in black appeared. The second man in black took off his hood, revealing long silvery hair and piercing green eyes. There was something extremely odd about the way the color in his eyes seemed to pulse with energy.

"You've gone far enough, little swordsman. Today you die."

The silvery-haired man snapped his fingers and the board Link was standing on snapped beneath him. Link managed to throw his arms out, grabbing the rails, but he lacked the strength to pull himself up. Days of light meals had taken it's toll on his endurance and stamina.

The silvery-haired man spoke one word before he laughed and disappeared into a cloud of darkness: "Choose."

Walter tittered and raised his hands to the sky in excitement. "This is it gunslinger! Do you sacrifice the boy in order to catch the man you've chased for so long, or do you save him and relinquish any chance you have of catching me!"

Walter abruptly turned and ran out of the tunnel. Roland looked back at Link, who was struggling over the abyss.

"I can't get up by myself! Help me Roland!"

The gunslinger looked at the exit, then back at Link. He couldn't move.

Link gave up his hope that someone would do more than advise him on where to go next, what to fight, and who to talk to next. He would never have anything more than a guide.

"Go then, there are other worlds than these."

Roland turned and ran to the exit as Link fell.


	9. A1  Chapter 9

**AN: **This marks the ending of Arc One. The ending of this book directly corresponds to the ending of "The Gunslinger". I highly suggest you read that, by the way. I'll start on the second arc soon enough, I promise! Thank you again for reading.

* * *

_The Gunslinger – Palaver_

The gunslinger kept hearing the boy's voice as he ran after the man in black. _Go then, there are other worlds than these._

A couple of tears streamed down from the gunslinger's cold eyes. The wind swept them off his face almost as quickly as they came, but he was well aware that they had existed. Tears shed for a fallen friend.

A fallen son.

The gunslinger ran down the slope and turned, coming out from behind a bluff of rocks. He saw a path ahead of him that lead to a circle of death.

It was set in a small clearing, the circle of death. Huge bones mimicked the ancient stones of Stonehenge, the ground was littered with skulls and bones of many dead creatures. They crunched under the gunslinger's boots with every step.

Walter was sitting on the ground, cross-legged, waiting for him. "I see you've killed another for the Dark Tower. You're a broken record, my old friend. Well, you've caught me fair and square, so I'll spill the beans. Your fate shall be unveiled to you."

And just like that, the sun set and it was dark. Walter produced another chicken from his sleeve and began to cook it over the fire. He offered some to Roland, who refused.

"Afraid of enchanted meat, Roland?"

"No, I just don't want to put anything in my mouth that has touched your flesh."

Walter tittered his nails-on-chalkboard laughter and ate his chicken while the gunslinger merely sat by the fire.

"Alright Roland, you've waited long enough, so here it is."

The man in black produced a deck of tarot cards from his sleeve. He shuffled them, and laid out five cards: The Tower, The Sailor, The Prisoner, The Moon, and The Chariot. He held out The Tower to Roland.

"This, Roland, is the thing of which you seek. It is the object of your obsession. How many more souls will you damn on your way to it?"

He tittered again and threw the card into the fire.

"This next card, is The Sailor. It stands for the boy, the one you let fall. He sailed through time as someone would sail back and forth across a river. Oh well, that's over now!"

Again, Walter threw the card into the fire. He drew the next card.

"The Prisoner."

Roland looked closely at the card. He saw a man with a troubled, dying face. On the man's back was a grinning monkey whose fingers were literally sunk into the back of the man's neck.

"The oracle told you the first of your three is infested by a demon called MAKO. My friend of mine that you met back there is also infested with this demon. He hunts The Prisoner, and I'd be worried about that if I were you. He's quite a trig one. Moving on!"

Walter threw the card into the fire. The monkey looked even more sinister as it burned.

"The Moon. This card represents the last one of your chosen three. He's the son of the most famous vampire known to many worlds. Tell me, have you ever heard of Dracula?"

Roland blinked twice and answered a dull, "No."

"Ah, that's unfortunate. This fellow is of royalty, a baron. You'll like him, aye, you will!"

Walter tossed the card into the fire. There was only one more card. He held it out to Roland.

"The Chariot. This will carry you across the Waste Lands, gunslinger. You've already met one of the ferrymen, but wait until you see his sidekick! A peppy little bastard, I daresay."

Walter tossed the last card into the fire and stared hard at the gunslinger.

"Tell me Roland, how long do you think we've been here?"

Roland stared back blankly. He didn't realize it before, but he felt as if he had been sitting there for…days?

"That's right Roland! We've been here for days, many of them! 'How has it stayed nighttime?' you may ask. Well, gunslinger, my master has kept the night for as long as I needed. You see, he's the orchestrator of everything. He's more powerful than you or I can even comprehend! You'll die on your quest before you meet him, I'm sure."

Roland continued his death-glare. Walter was beginning to get under his skin, which is something he'd been fighting since they sat down. He had the urge to reach over there and strangle him until that annoying tittering ceased forever.

"Before you strangle me, Roland, I want to show you something. Close your eyes."

"Fuck you."

"Now Roland, don't be racy with me. Close your eyes or this will go nowhere."

The gunslinger finally did as he was told, and he found himself back in that darkness. The darkness of that dream where he first fought the heartless.

* * *

He found himself standing on another pillar with the stained glass top. In this decoration was the tower, surrounded by scores of statues holding roses. Walter's voice was suddenly all around him.

"These statues represent fallen heroes of the worlds that are getting destroyed by the Tower. The Tower is weakening, gunslinger, and it is opening temporal rifts that are splitting worlds apart. Hee hee!"

Roland was swept up in a tornado of crimson, getting whisked up and up. Higher he went. Mountains zoomed by, then clouds, and suddenly, he was amongst the stars. He could see planets and other galaxies, meteors, suns.

A sudden burst of light starting exploding in Roland's vision. It was a rose, stained purple, and in the center of the rose was a sun.

No, not _a _sun. Every sun. All the suns. The light grew exponentially more intense by the second. Roland began to scream, _"ENOUGH WALTER! MAKE IT STOP! TAKE AWAY THE LIGHT!"_

The light engulfed him and he fell unconscious.

He awoke next to the fire with a start. Walter was there, dusting off his clothes as if he'd taken a rustle in the dust. "Gods, you made it. I could have never showed that to your father, he'd have gone mad."

Roland tried to think but all that came to mind was that rose. It was painful to see, but it was also the most beautiful thing he'd seen in his entire life.

"I'm telling you one last time, gunslinger. Renounce the tower. Go home. Start a life."

"Go fuck yourself, Walter."

"No thank you." Walter clapped his hands, and daylight came all at once.

Roland felt ten years older. His long black hair which had only been graced by a handful of grey hairs was now rifled with a score of them. His bones felt stressed, and he felt more tired than ever before. Walter was nothing more than a skeleton in a pile of robes.

Roland ripped off Walter's jawbone and took it with him. _The boy was carrying the last one when he…_

Roland couldn't finish the thought. He looked to the West and saw the Western Sea before him. Miles of beach and sand stretched on into the horizon. He walked over to the sand line and found a rusted metal bench there.

Roland sat on the bench, lit a cigarette, and stared out at the sea.


	10. Arc Two Chapter 1

**AN: **This marks the beginning of Arc Two: The Re-Drawing of the Three. Not the most creative title, I know, but I'm sure we'll both live through the experience. If you want to read the original book for this section of the Dark Tower series, you're looking for "The Drawing of the Three" by Stephen King. I recommend reading that along with Legends for the full experience of the story :D

Thanks a million for sticking with me thus far, I hope I continue to hold your interest until the very end. -Dylan Kennedy

_

* * *

_

_The Gunslinger – The Beach_

Roland sat on that rusty bench, staring out at the sea for several hours after the palaver.

Perhaps it was the sheer immenseness of the sea itself. He had simply never seen so much water before, especially not in one place. Water was not exactly _sparse _Gilead by any means, but after nearly dying of dehydration in the desert, anything more than a puddle is certainly a sight to behold.

He walked down to the waterline and looked all around him. Back the way he came was obviously not the right way, but for some reason he could have sworn he saw some dust rise up from the circle of bones.

He shrugged it off and decided to head north, following the tide-line up the beach. The sun began to set after sometime, and the first of the lobstrosities rolled out of the water.

These things were lobsters the size of a small horse. Lobster-monstrosities. Lobstrosities. Makes sense, right? Don't get mad at me if it sounds lame, I didn't coin that shit.

It rolled out of the water, popping out of the roll with it's claws out and ready for battle. Roland blinked twice at the creature, underestimating the immediate danger he was in.

The lobstrosity charged him and knocked him down before he could draw. His gun got stuck on the holster when he fell, and the creature bore down on top of him, pinning his limbs down with it's massive size. A claw swiped at his face, he rolled his head to the right to avoid having his skull caved in.

Unfortunately for the gunslinger, that exposed his left eye to the claw, which promptly smashed it into jelly. Blood gushed out of the wound and over the gunslinger's face. It trickled into his mouth as he screamed in pain.

When the lobstrosity opened it's mouth to began devouring Roland, and ending this story prematurely, a loud sound erupted into the air. "CHUG-" the lobstrosity was hit with something "-CLIIIITAAAAAAAACK!" and suddenly, it was flying away from the gunslinger to none other than the boy.

Link had some strange contraption over his right arm which was pulling the lobstrosity over via a hook and chain. He drew his sword with his free hand and made mincemeat of the monster as it came within striking distance.

Roland would have cried tears of joy if he wasn't busy bleeding blood and eye juice all over himself. Link hurried over and dragged Roland away from the tide, and the incoming lobstrosities, to the grass area several yards east of the water.

The gunslinger ripped a long scrap from his shirt and attempted to tie it around his head. His hands were too shaky and he kept fumbling the cloth and the attempted knot. Link took the cloth from him and tied it around his head slightly angled, like a crooked bandanna.

The tears of joy finally came, stinging the eye wound with their salt. "I'm sorry that I…I…"

Link started crying too, creating small tracks down his dusty face. "Y-you nuh-nuh-needed to," the boy managed to stutter.

"I should have never let you fall for the Tower, Link." The gunslinger pulled the boy close to him, feeling a spike of pain as the boy's shoulder brushed against his new wound. He gritted his teeth against the pain. "I'll never drop you again Link…"

But in the deep recesses of the gunslinger's mind, he wondered if that was true or not.

He awoke the next day, starving and throbbing with pain. His eye was a burning mess of pain and infection. The claw that ruined the gunslinger's left eye was far from sterile, and with the wound came severe bacterial infection.

He felt week, feverish, and guilty. _I don't deserve to be alive, let alone, have the boy back._

His father's voice responded, _And yet, you have life and a second chance. Better get moving._

Roland heeded the advice and set out down the beach with Link.

* * *

They traveled several miles that day, not finding much other than sand, shells, more sand, and some rocks here and there. Roland's fever worsened throughout the day, and he was writhing around in agony by the fire that night.

He needed something, anything to take his mind off of the fever and the pain. He worked up the courage necessary to ask this difficult question, but after a time he managed to croak, "Link, if you don't mind me asking, how did you-" he had to fight to keep from tearing up again "-manage survive that fall in the tunnel?"

Link shuddered, then stared right at the gunslinger. He almost said, "After you _dropped _me?" but the gunslinger's condition stopped him. His complexion was noticeably pale, and his eyes sometimes rolled back a little into his head. Roland of Gilead was not feeling well. Not at all.

Link remained silent, but reached into his shrink-bag, pulling out an object which expanded in his hands. It was the arm contraption from earlier. He slipped it over his right arm and stood up.

"I pulled this out quickly as I fell and was able to sink a shot inbetween the wooden planks in the track. One in a thousand chance, I guess I got lucky."

He fired at a nearby elm tree. "CHUG-" the hook sped toward its target, followed by a chain. It met it's mark, the chain suddenly went taut, "-CLIIITAAAAAAACK!" and Link was pulled through the air at the tree. He walked back and sat down by the fire.

"The Hookshot. I had one that looked a little different back in Hyrule, but this one works the same way. Longer chain, though. Another gift from Termina. Pretty awesome, huh?"

Roland nodded weakly. _A very neat device indeed. I hope you have to never _need _how you did back in the tunnel ever again. I'll make sure of that._

* * *

The gunslinger fell back into sleep. He dreamt that he was falling again, but instead of landing on another one of those stained-glass pictures, he fell into the body of the boy.

Link was standing on some sort of flower in a fairly large puddle. They were in a dark chamber, but two beam-lights suddenly crossed in the center.

A demon hung in the air, wearing a mask of unimaginable power. Around him floated two fairies.

"That useless horse wouldn't listen to a word I said, so I got rid of it for you."

Link recoiled in shock; the loss of a friend was just another thing to make this day even worse. He'd already been robbed of his precious ocarina in the forest, and now his horse was gone indefinitely. Great.

"But I have better plans for you. You really think you can stand up to me? May the darkness swallow you whole!"

The demon shook its masked head back and forth rapidly, sending out powerful waves of magical energy at the boy. Link keeled over, gripping his head.

_The boy was suddenly standing in blackness, being slowly surrounded by a pack of hostile plant-creatures named Deku Scrubs. They closed in on him menacingly, and the gunslinger saw all of this._

_The creatures disappeared as a Deku Scrub the size of a house began charging at Link. Link tried to run, but the Deku swallowed him up._

When the boy was conscious again, he felt awkward and misshapen. His body seemed harder, but lighter. He looked in the water and fear drove itself in like a spike.

Burning orange eyes, a wooden body, and a large hollow "O"-shaped hole for a mouth.

Link was turned into a Deku Scrub.

The boy began freaking out and he attempted to scream, only managing to wail in some odd dialect unknown to him.

The floating demon laughed hysterically and floated out of the room with one of the fairies. A stone door closed behind him, locking in the boy and the other fairy.

Before Roland could see anymore, he was swept out of the dream.


	11. A2 Chapter 2

**AN: **I apologize in advance for the preposterous amount of line breaks in this chapter. I just had a lot of separate thoughts and I wanted them to pop out a certain way. Forgive me.

* * *

_The Gunslinger and The Boy – The Beach_

Roland woke up to the feeling of getting punched in the forehead from the inside. The infection was eating away at him; headaches, fever, cold sweats, and the flares of intense pain from his crippled eye were just delightful.

He considered not talking to Link about what he saw in his dream, but decided that he owed the boy a lot more trust in that. Link had forgiven him of one of the worst transgressions imaginable, after all.

"Link, were you ever assaulted by a masked demon?"

Link's mouth dropped a few inches, his eyes wide with shock. "How did you-?"

"I saw things in my dreams last night, Link. I saw you falling; I saw the masked one turn you into some strange creature I've never seen before."

"A Deku Scrub, yeah. That demon was called the Skull Kid, he was being possessed the whole time by that mask. Majora's Mask." Link shivered and looked at the ground, as if Majora was standing before him once more, eyes burning with the desire to consume and destroy.

Roland clapped a hand on the boy's shoulder. "I've faced many evils in my years on this world, Link. But it would seem you've faced at least twice that number. You really are a courageous young lad, and I'm glad to have you by my side. Now, let's keep going down this beach, hopefully we'll find something to keep me from dying."

* * *

After walking for a few hours, Link decided to try to cheer up the mood a little. He brought out the precious item which had kept him safe ever since the day he had to pull the Master Sword from its pedestal in the Temple of Time.

The Ocarina of Time.

What people in my world (and yours) refer to as a "sweet potato ocarina". The term described the shape rather well. The ocarina itself was deep blue with a fine glaze that made it shine a little in the sunlight. There were five holes and a mouthpiece. The mouthpiece was adorned with the holy symbol of Hyrule: the Triforce. The triforce was a series of triangles that stacked to make one large triangle. The uppermost, lower left, and lower right triangles were golden and they each stood for something: The top was power, the left was wisdom, and the right was courage.

The boy played a cheery little tune as he walked along. Roland listened well, despite his infection taking a constant toll on his will and very being, and the song made him think of mighty forests. The kind of forests where the leaf density is so thick that only small beams of light make it through, casting brilliant shadows around on the ground.

Link finally finished his tune and they stopped to get a drink. The skins were getting rather low, and both of them knew they'd eventually have to go back away from the beach to find some sort of spring or river.

Link was finishing his last sip when he saw a glimmer of something in the distance, miles and miles down the beach. It was getting closer to sunset now, they wouldn't make it to the object today, but tomorrow. Tomorrow, maybe.

"Roland, do you see that?"

"I've seen it for a while now. I may have lost an eye, but it seems my other one has decided to work twice as hard." He tried to laugh, but wet coughs came out instead. He spat a disgusting combination of blood and mucus on the ground.

"Let's go back to the elms, we'll make camp and set out early tomorrow."

They made camp, they found spring water, and they talked.

Link was sharpening his sword when he finally decided to begin the long task of telling his story.

"Roland, I started on my first adventure when I was eight years old. I've been fighting almost non-stop ever since."

Roland said nothing, he merely looked on at the boy, waiting for him to continue.

"I was having another nightmare…"

* * *

_Link was tossing and turning in his sleep, dreaming of fire and war. He saw a knight with long blonde hair and a braided beard dueling against a demonic foe. The knight's combination of black and golden armor clashed against the crooked plates of black and deep purple of his foe._

_The demon was perhaps once a man, his shape vaguely resembled one, but he had been too twisted by the power of darkness for one to be entirely sure._

_The golden knight swung his mighty sword, which was almost as long as he was tall, at the demon in a wide arc. His foe parried with his own weapon: a putrid longsword which was not straight as a normal sword, but curvy._

Link awoke to a bright light flashing in his face. "HEY! LISTEN! HEY!"

It was a small, blue fairy flying around his room. "Wake up you lazy bum! The Great Deku Tree wants to talk to you!"

The Great Deku Tree was the guardian of Kokiri Forest, the place where Link lived. Not surprisingly, the people of the forest were called the Kokiri. They were children who never aged, but could not live outside of the forest.

Link spent the next hour or two rummaging in the grass for rupees, the currency of both Hyrule and Termina, before finally buying a shield. The guard in front of the tunnel that led to the Great Deku Tree wouldn't let him pass without one.

"Hold it right there," he said, holding out a hand of authority. "No one gets by without a shield."

Link pointed at the dinky wooden thing on his back.

"Oh. So you found a shield…" the tunnel guardian seemed stumped. He tapped his foot in annoyance, then, hatched another idea.

"But that shield won't save you from things that spit fire, or things that have giant scary spikes and other assorted things that might attack you in this tunnel!"

Link gave the guard a stare that would send shivers down the spine of Satan.

"But h-hey," the guard stammered in fear. "Th-there's a sword in the grotto over there! Go get it and I'll let you through."

Link got the sword and returned to the guard. For a brief moment, it seemed as though he considered breaking its virginity right there by killing the guard.

He took the high road instead, merely walking into the tunnel to find all of the "super scary" monsters everyone talked about: flowers that constantly opened and closed their mouths. They stood about six feet high and flailed around, but that was pretty much where the threat ended.

The Great Deku Tree was enormous, as big as a small skyscraper. The biggest tree in all of Hyrule. Link sat down on the grass while he received it's counsel.

"Thou have come to me, Link, in my final hours. I am cursed, and ye are the only one who may possess the courage to sever its wretched grasp on me."

Link was about to say something when he was cut off by the Great Deku Tree, "Enter me, my son, and destroy the source of the curse."

The Great Deku Tree opened its mouth wide enough for Link to walk in.

* * *

"I found all kinds of weird things lurking within the tree, but I'll tell the rest of that story another time. My voice kinda hurts from talking."

Roland patted the boy's knee and drifted off.

* * *

The found the door early on in the day.

It stood alone on the beach, a dark ironwood door adorned with a crystalline knob. Upon closer inspection, Roland found that the knob had a carving of a rose and a revolver on it.

Link tried turning the knob, but it wouldn't budge.

Roland fell to his knees against the door. The infection was sapping his strength away; he was running out of time and they both knew it.

"I'm going to open this door, Link. I need you to be ready for anything that might come through."

Link drew his sword and shield, taking a stance of battle. The gunslinger opened the door and collapsed into the sand.

Link could see inside the door, but he had no idea what he was looking at.

* * *

"Come on, hurry up you slow-ass piece of shit…"

_He sure seems impatient, _thought Roland. The gunslinger was inside the impatient man's mind, but far back enough to keep his presence a secret.

A bulb flashed green and the impatient man flicked a few switches, bringing up some images on a monitor. Roland couldn't figure out they were, but he found that he could search inside the man's head for the answer.

He came up with the word "Photographs", but had a hard time pronouncing it. _Whatever these fottergraffs are, they seem pretty important._

Two heavily armed men came around a corner. They both drew automatic machine guns and pointed them at the impatient man.

"Cloud, give it up! What are you trying to do here?"

"I'm trying to expose all of Shinra Corporation for the bastards you really are. Everyone may be forgiving you for what you did to the planet with your Mako reactors, but the truth about the monsters in this world is a secret you've kept to yourselves. Not anymore."

_There's that word. MAKO. _Roland searched the man's mind and found that it was some sort of energy that could power machines, but could also enhance the fighting ability within people when coupled with something called "Jenova cells".

The impatient man took a small piece of plastic out of the instrument panel and threw a grenade at the two guards as they began to open fire. He turned around and ran down the corridor, slapping something against the wall.

He jumped down from a balcony onto his motorcycle as the corridor above him blew up in a spray of fire and debris.

He sped off down the street, heading for the highway. He turned a corner and saw the on-ramp. He was about to hit the turbo when two massive tanks backed up in front of the ramp.

Cloud made a wide U-turn in the road and headed back down the street he came from. Two more tanks closed off his path. He drew his sword and leapt off his bike, allowing it to collide with the tanks and explode.

He ran down an alleyway, ducking behind a dumpster. He could hear sirens and the shouts of Shinra guards closing in around him.

_Cloud, listen to my voice and stay calm._

"What, who the hell is talking to me?" Cloud replied aloud. He slapped his mouth shut after, realizing the fatal mistake he just made.

_Yell any louder and they might find you._

Roland turned around during this conversation and noticed that he could see the door and beyond it, Link and the beach. He had an idea, but he wasn't sure that it would work.

_I can get you out of here._

"Liar." Cloud responded in his mind.

_No, you need to listen to me or you are going to die. Turn around._

Cloud reluctantly turned. He found himself staring at a doorway in the middle of the alley. It hadn't been there when he ran in here…had it?

_Go through the door. _

Cloud walked through the door and into the sunlight of the beach, bringing Roland with him.


	12. A2 Chapter 3

_The Gunslinger, The Boy, and the Prisoner – The Beach_

Link stumbled back and nearly fell over as Cloud came through the door. The gunslinger had left the beach, his body inert and lifeless on the beach, but now he sat up and accompanied by someone else?

Roland Deschain is full of surprises, it seems.

Cloud squinted and blinked rapidly as he came through into the sun. It had been nighttime in Midgar, and the intensity of the daylight burned his eyes.

Yeah, there were those. His eyes. Link noticed something strange about those eyes the second he stepped through, but the connections weren't quite forming.

Roland was wiser to form these connections. He remembered very well where he'd seen those eyes. Even in his sickness, fever and all, he drew his gun and pointed it at Cloud.

"Stop moving or I'll send you to the clearing. Your eyes… I've seen them before. You're hiding something about yourself, and I'd hear it."

Cloud felt an urge to draw his sword and cut the dying gunslinger deep. First he plays the hero, taking him out of the Shinra shitstorm, then a holdup?

"What's it to you?" Cloud sneered.

"I've only seen one other person, if you could call him that, with eyes like yours. He spoke your name to me in a dream and also tried to kill yon boy over there." Roland jerked a thumb at Link. "He had hair kind of like yours, too. Except it was silvery, not blonde. And longer."

Cloud's mind exploded with thoughts. Sephiroth? No. It couldn't be, Sephiroth had been defeated. Hell, he had been defeated _twice_.

_But if he came back once…_

Not possible. Was it?

Cloud heard his voice within his mind. It was just as dreadful and evil as the last time he heard it, _"It's completely possible Cloud. As long as you carry darkness in your heart, I shall live."_

Cloud shook his head violently, clearing away the intrusion. "Sephiroth. I've done battle with him before, he's an evil bastard. Do you know where he is?"

Roland put his gun away, satisfied. "No, but I know where he's going."

A long sigh fell out of Roland's mouth. One might say he "had a lot of explainin' to do".

"Sephiroth follows a man named Walter, who I had been chasing for a long time. When Link and I caught up with them, Sephiroth tried to kill Link and then vanished. Walter is long-dead, although something tells me that might not even be completely true. Walter said that he is a servant of a mighty entity that is trying to bring down the Dark Tower, which is a nexus to all worlds and whens. If Walter serves this being, I'm sure Sephiroth does as well."

He took a breath. In his current state, talking was harsh and he knew time was running short.

"If they topple the Tower, all existence shall be destroyed. I can't let them do that, but I can't do it alone either. I need you to help me save not just this world, but yours, and every other when and where in all of existence."

Cloud scratched his chin. Sephiroth was certainly capable in destroying things, taking life, and bringing ruin. He had almost killed Cloud's world more than once, so going after all worlds certainly wasn't out of the cards.

But his world was still in danger. Shinra was back up to it's old tricks, it wouldn't be long before things got real bad again.

"Look, guy-"

"Roland, son of Steven. Roland Deschain is my full name."

"Look Roland, I can't go with you to save this tower or anything. I can't just save the universe, I have problems of my own."

"_That's right Cloud. You can't save anyone. You can't even save yourself."_

No way, fuck that.

"…Not yet, at least. Let me finish my business in Midgar, then I'll go with you until I defeat Sephiroth. I guess I can't just sit back and let him do to other people's worlds what he's done to mine."

Link threw his fist up in the air and brought it down with a loud "YES!" Cloud laughed lightly and a rare smile formed itself on Roland's face.

Cloud kneeled down to inspect the dying gunslinger. He noticed some blood had dried on the bandanna around his eyewound.

"Messed up your eye, eh Roland? It's fine, chicks dig scars." He nudged an elbow into Link's ribs, making the boy giggle.

He lifted the bandanna and all of the fever was explained. Massive colonies of bacteria had formed on the wound, infecting Roland's blood and sapping his energy. The wound pussed a little, and Link nearly threw up on Cloud.

Cloud put the bandanna back over the wound and held a vial of green liquid out to Roland. "I don't know if this will work, but I'd say it's worth a try. Drink up, buddy."

Roland took the vial and downed it's contents. For a few moments, his hope sank down into his stomach and nearly died. Then, suddenly, the blazing inferno of his fever cooled down. The roaring pain of his crippled eye quieted to a whisper.

Roland felt a little energy return to his body, so he stood up. He leveled his remaining bombardier's eye with Cloud's pulsing-green Mako eyes.

"Thank you."

Cloud merely nodded in reply and turned around, facing the door. It had closed after Cloud came through, but it was still there. Roland took a step around the side, inspecting the frame. For a second he could see it, then it seemed to disappear at a certain point, making the door seem only two-dimensional.

Link now fully appreciated the weapon Cloud carried. A sword, nearly as tall as Cloud himself, and by extension, bigger than Link.

He had seen someone wield a sword that big before, but who? And where?

The dream. The one about the golden knight fighting the black knight. The one he had before the fairy woke him up to send him on a series of events that would lead him to this very point and place in time.

Link pointed at the sword on Cloud's back and Roland winked his one remaining eye. He was making the same connection, despite not having the dream himself. He had pictured the sword differently than how Link had seen it, but this was still fairly close.

_Ka, the ever-turning wheel, _thought the gunslinger.

Cloud attempted to turn the knob, but it refused to budge. He tried again, using the manly-man method of simply applying more force. Nothing.

"Roland, what the hell is wrong with this stupid door?" Cloud restrained himself from kicking the damn thing.

"Only opens for me. I'll open it for you, then follow in after. Don't worry, I'll be in your thoughts just like last time." He didn't know how he knew this, but he did.

Cloud stepped back through the door and into the alley. Roland followed, falling into a lifeless shell on the beach. Now that Cloud was aware of Roland's presence, he couldn't ignore it. It was like seeing something odd in a picture, something so peculiar that you couldn't just _un-see _it.

He knew he couldn't go back out the way he came. Even though civilians had returned to the street, going about their nightly activities, he was sure that there'd be undercover Shinra agents around.

He went out the other end, molding himself into the flowing crowd of people.

"I need to get to Tifa's bar…"he muttered to himself, and to Roland.

_Where does this 'Tifa' live?_

"Out in the ruins of Sector 7. It'll be quite a walk, it's not like I can take a train or something."

"That's right Cloud, you can't go anywhere." A hand clamped down on Cloud's shoulder from behind. "Please don't make this difficult, you know how badly I could hurt you." The voice was cocky and full of arrogance.

"Reno, you have three seconds before I end you." Cloud growled, spinning around to face his would-be capturer. Reno threw a wink at him.

"Been awhile, eh Cloud? I hear you're trying to take down Shinra again. Honestly, I don't blame you. Things really went to hell after Rufus disappeared."

"Yeah, I hear some guy named Richard Sayre is in charge now. Mako reactors are coming back online in the other continents. I can't let them hurt the planet again, Reno."

"Neither can we." Two shapes came out of the crowd and stood next to Reno. The stream of people forked around the small gathering, not paying any attention to their conversation. One of the newcomers was a tall, dark-skinned man with sunglasses on, despite the fact that it was nighttime. The other was a pretty blonde woman with a blue suit and high heels.

"Rude and Elena. Haven't seen you two in forever and a half. What do you guys want?"

Reno through his hair back. "We all want things in this life, don't we Cloud? We want Rufus back, and you want Sayre gone. We have a mutual enemy, you see."

He patted Cloud's shoulder. "We'll get you to Tifa. Just promise that you'll find Rufus."

"I can't promise you anything, Reno, other than the demise of Shinra Corporation. But if I happen to _find _Rufus, I'll send him your way. How's that?"

Rude threw in a satisfied grunt and Elena stuck her nose up in the air as if to say, "Still a wiseguy, eh Cloud?" Despite this show of defiance, she secretly lusted after that attitude. Cloud may be a smartass, but she'd be more than willing to let him into her room for a night or twelve.

Reno snapped his fingers and a limousine pulled up next to them. They trudged through the crowd and entered the car.

Roland marveled at the car, remembering all of the rusted-up relics he'd seen in his world. _A motor-carriage that runs, imagine that._

Cloud heard the thoughts of the gunslinger, but did not entertain a response. The people with him now might be allies, but he doubted they'd stay that way if Cloud started talking to himself like a madman.

Cloud looked out the window and noticed that it had started to rain. The beads of water rolling down the window threw the glare of neon lights around, painting a pretty picture. He found peace in the beauty of it, his mind calming down after going through all of the day's bullshit.

They pulled up to 7th Heaven (that was the name of the bar) and Cloud disembarked from the vehicle. He said his thank-yous and goodbyes to the Turks before going inside.

The bar was empty and the lights were out. "She must have closed early this evening," Cloud said aloud.

Tifa came down from the stairs and noticed his presence. She did not greet him with her usual smile, however, as he approached her.

"There was an explosion at Shinra's headquarters today, Cloud." She regarded him sternly.

She said his name at the end of her sentence. Cloud knew this was code for "you're in trouble".

"Yeah, heard about it from some people. The guy got away." Cloud avoided looking at her, that stare was piercing.

"Oh, that's _wonderful. _What's this on your sleeve?" She swiped at his sleeve, knocking some dust off of it.

"Oh, well you see, I was lifting some really heavy boxes. No, seriously, these things were massive as shit. But they'd been…neglected, so they were all dusty, right. Yeah." Cloud flashed a shit-eating grin, which was promptly slapped off his face.

"You can't do stuff like that Cloud! I know Shinra is going down that same corrupt path as before, but you've got responsibilities now! You promised to take care of Marlene while Barret is away."

"Yeah, she won't have a place to live if the plane-"

"If Shinra comes here and kills us in order to get _you. _Cloud, you said that you-you'd," tears were forming in Tifa's eyes.

"You said that you'd be here for me. And for this."

She grabbed his hand and placed it on her stomach. The signs of pregnancy had yet to show on Tifa Lockhart, but Cloud knew what he'd done. He knew that his seed had kindled, sure enough.

"Listen, I know what I said, and I meant it. But we can't let Shinra get away with this! We need to stop them, and there's something else too."

She looked up at him, her big brown eyes stabbing guilt into his heart.

"I'm going to be…going away for a while. Bu-But you can come with me!"

Tifa placed her hand on her forehead and sighed. It was always the same old story with Cloud Strife. Afraid to commit, afraid to love. Afraid to _be _loved.

"You just don't get it, do you Cloud?"

"Look Tifa, I never meant to start anything that I couldn't finish, but this is bigger than both of us," he handed her the jump-drive. She looked down at it, a small smile creeping across her face.

"I'll give this to Barret. Cloud, I can tell you don't want to tell me what you need to do or where you need to go, but just promise me one thing, okay?"

"Anything, just name it." He took her hands in his and looked deep into her eyes.

"Come back to me alive, and ready to raise your child."

He kissed the corner of her mouth. "I will, and I'll think of a name while I'm gone."

She smiled and let go of his hands. "Get going Cloud. And if you decide to cry off and come home, I won't judge you. Now go do whatever you need to do."

He flashed her a grin and a wink before turning and walking out of the bar. As he walked into the rain, he felt a single tear roll out of his right eye. Today was full of intuitions, and the feeling that he'd never see Tifa's 7th Heaven ever again was overwhelming.

_You'll come back someday, Cloud._

"Yeah. I will."

Cloud pulled the hood of his cloak over his head and ventured forth into the night.


	13. A2 Chapter 4

_The Gunslinger, The Prisoner, and The Boy – The Beach_

After stepping back into the rain, Cloud turned and walked through the door in his mind, leaving Midgar behind.

Two weeks after this, Roland's fever came back.

"Maybe the Antidote I gave you wasn't strong enough," was Cloud's hypothesis. He would have felt bad for the gunslinger if not for the resentment he'd been harboring lately. He blamed Roland for taking his life away. His family, his city, all of it.

But was it really Roland's fault? Cloud had been throwing that life away ever since Richard P. Sayre came to town. He could hardly say it was Roland's fault that Cloud chose to reform AVALANCHE in order to take down Shinra again. With his AVALANCHE activities, he often left Tifa to her own devices at the bar.

And yet, it was still easier to blame the gunslinger than it was to take responsibility for his own choices.

Roland came in and out of reality during the days leading up to the Full Moon. He always found energy to walk down the beach, ever northward, during the day. But at nighttime, he would pass out early and slip into delirium. He seemed to be having nightmares of his past. One night he rolled over and reached out to Cloud, his eyes rolled back into his skull, and screaming, "_NO CUTHBERT! _The horn! Give me the horn! Don't let me forget it!"

Cloud inched back a bit, taken completely by surprise. He looked over at Link and shrugged. _I don't know who the fuck Cuthbert is either, buddy._

Perhaps if Roland wasn't busy reliving the horrors of Jericho Hill, he could have spotted the one who had been watching them since sundown.

Two red eyes watched their every move. Their redness was piercing, their accuracy sharp, especially on the night of a full moon.

The owner of the red eyes pulled the hood of his baron's cloak over his head to conceal himself further. He was starting to notice how different this world smelled than his own. The sharp salty tang of the air continued to linger in his nose.

He looked down the beach toward where he had come from. It already seemed like an eternity had gone by…

_He runs down the hallway, the candle light casting eerie shadows on the plush burgundy carpet. His boots make muffled thuds as he runs, his platinum hair flowing behind him. The night air would be chilling, if he were a normal man._

_A floating head with snakes for hair sees him turn the corner. It speeds towards him, descending and then ascending slightly as it goes. A quick slash of his rapier dispatches the foe and he continues on as if nothing has changed._

_The words of Death himself ring in his head, "How dare you threaten your own father, Alucard! You shall regret those words! We shall meet again!"_

_Yeah, maybe in Hell._

_Alucard jumps down from the end of the hallway down to a balcony below. He thrusts open the huge double doors and is faced with his very destiny._

_A marble staircase leading to another pair of double doors at the top. The doors that would take him to the inverted Castlevania, and ultimately, the lair of his father._

_A lone figure stands in his way. Shrouded in a black priest's robe, the figure speaks:_

"_Are you sure you really want to go through that door? Do you even know what's on the other side?"_

"_Of course I do, my destiny lies beyond the door."_

"_Indeed it does, little vampire. Tee-hee-hee!" the man's titter reminds Alucard of the sound of bones breaking._

"_Get out of my way, phantom, or I'll strike you down where you stand."_

"_No need for violence, we're all friends here little vampire. But seriously, feel free to call of this little quest of yours. Turn around, leave, enjoy a life somewhere else, hmm? Leave this to the real vampire killers, the Belmonts. Those fine fellows."_

"_No." He swipes at the phantom, but it turns to smoke before his blade meets its mark._

_Alucard shrugs off the encounter, mounting the stairs one by one. Slowly at first, he climbs. Then he speeds up. Faster. Faster. The anxiety and adrenaline pumps through him. He throws open the doors while running at a full sprint, but finds not the inverted castle._

_His nostrils are assaulted by the smell of saltwater. He hears the cries of foreign creatures in the night, but he can't stop himself. He's running too fast. He runs through the door and turns around in the sand, but as he starts to run back to the door, it closes and collapses into the sand._

_He runs through the spot where it was and falls to his knees, sliding in the sand. Alucard cries out in anguish, looking to the moon. The pale complexion of the moon stares back, cold, unforgiving._

"My destiny lies beyond the door. I now regret these words," he uttered under his breath as he continued to watch the camp below.

The gunslinger reached towards the pot of stew on the fire and collapsed into the sand, throwing up as he fell. Cloud leaped over to him, knocking his own bowl of food across the sand. Roland began to seize up and his eyes rolled back into his head.

Roland of Gilead was dying.

Link froze up with shock. There was no convienent fairy in a bottle, no blue potion, no song of time. Nothing he had could save the gunslinger from his fate.

Nothing _he _had.

Cloud reached into his bag and bought out a golden vial with wings attached to the cap. Inside was a bright green liquid the same brilliant color as his eyes.

Cloud poured the liquid over Roland's still body. It slowly fell over him at first, seeming to do nothing. Then, as it seemed all was lost, a light began to envelop Roland. A bright green light glowed around him and his eyes opened. Complexion came back into his skin, and he pulled himself up so he was on one knee.

He looked at Cloud and their eyes met, and for the first time, Cloud saw Roland for what he really was. He saw Roland's remaining eye shine with the experience of a thousand battles and a thousand more to come. He saw empires fall and rise.

He saw the White in that gunslinger's eye, and he wasn't the only one.

Alucard marveled at the scene unfolding before him. Maybe this world wasn't so empty after all. Its inhabitants seemed capable of compassion.

He turned himself into a cloud of mist and floated down to the beach, forty paces away from the camp. Roland saw him and, originally, had no intent of going for his guns.

Then he saw something else and dipped for the big irons. Alucard saw it too and drew his sword.

A swirling white mass appeared behind Link and flung itself at him, almost knocking the boy into the campfire. Roland fired twice at it, but the bullets seemed to go right through the thing.

It shifted into a physical being (Cloud would later describe it as "a marionette wearing a zip-up silver jumpsuit). On its head was an inverted hearted with an arrow-shaped cross coming out.

Before Roland could fire another shot, a dagger pierced through the creature from behind. The blade went all the way through, sticking out of it's torso a bit. It remained in the air for a moment, impaled on the dagger, before dissipating into a cloud of white smoke. A giant rose-colored heart exploded out of it and into the sky.

The heart wasn't the shape of a human heart, but the shape of the heart one would find on a Watch Me card. One of the four suits.

Roland dropped his revolvers back into their holsters. "We are well met, Baron." Roland knew those clothes, and he knew them very well. Had he not seen the barons and royalty of Gilead walk around in that same style of cloak?

"Any meeting under the Full Moon is often seen as a bad omen. You should be less trusting."

"Who implied trust?"

They stood there, staring. Link had sulked over to a rock where he sat, beating himself up for how he let some _thing _get the drop on him. Cloud looked back and forth between the newcomer and the gunslinger rapidly.

Nobody said anything for a full minute. The silence was intense.

Alucard felt a tug on his sleeve. Link had moved over to him while everyone was busy participating in the Mexican standoff. His big blue eyes looked up at Alucard with kindness and curiosity. The boy offered a greeting.

"Hi."


	14. A2 Chapter 5

_Ka-tet – The Forest of Elms_

The gunslinger slipped in and out of reality, and even continuity of conciousness, in the handful of weeks following his near-death experience. During that time, the other three cared for him.

Cloud, Link, and Alucard became plenty acquainted in that time as they watched Roland come back to life. He would go through periods of relative inactivity (in which Cloud would have to feed him) and other times where he would writhe around and shout names from his haunted past. Once, he woke up as the others were eating and stared at Cloud, his eye wild with insanity.

He reached out to Cloud and screamed, "_CUTHBERT! I CAN'T FORGET THE HORN!_" before falling back into asleep lifelessly.

"He acts as if he is possessed by a demon," Alucard said as he bit into the chunk of rabbit that was his dinner. It seemed as though every animal in the forest other than rabbit had gone into hiding, so they ate rabbit. They ate a lot of it.

"The only demons in him are the demons of his past."

Cloud and Alucard exchanged looks before looking at Link, who had begun to take a sip of water as if he was merely stating the obvious. They were often surprised at the wisdom that the young boy possessed, constantly marveling over his achievements in combat and elocution. Of course, Link had told them the story of how he fought the bear on the mountains, and of course, they were impressed.

But then again, Alucard had fought Death himself.

* * *

_The gunslinger slipped in and out of reality, fact and fiction folded over one another. He found himself on a beach, not unlike the one where he found the Doors of Fate._

"_Come to me, my love."_

The gunslinger was young again; a boy of fourteen stands in the water. His guns are gone, but his hair has lost its grey and white strands, and his bones are full of life. His muscles, eager, propel him through the water toward the sand.

She stands at the water's edge, holding her hand out to him, her blonde hair glittering in the afternoon sun. He means to grab it, but a gust picks him up and takes him away from her in a torrent.

He finds himself staring at an open door. The room is dark, save for the light coming from the instrument panels connected to machines that control the door. The frame is pearly white, gothic style, and taller than three men.

"The Door to Darkness, but that's not all there is on the other side, is it?"

Roland whirls and at his right stands another boy, a bit older, wearing baggy clothes rife with zippers. His hair, even spikier than Cloud's, buffets as he turns to face the gunslinger.

"It's okay kid, we're on the same team." The older boy pats Roland on the back. "Just be there to catch the key when I throw it, okay?"

Before Roland can respond, he is jerked back to consciousness.

* * *

The gunslinger opened his eyes and saw sand, smoldering embers, and a plate with some pieces of over-cooked rabbit on it. He shoved these into his mouth, sitting up and stretching as he does so. The embers glowed in their pile of dwindling fury.

Roland looked around him and took in the sight. The forest, being dense, blocked out the majority of sunlight that fell upon it's face. An occasional beam or two made it through the ceiling, however, casting eerie shadows upon the land.

The gunslinger checked his ammunition and gear before the others woke up, counting out a total of 23 bullets and no food supplies. His tobacco had been long gone, and only the dusty remains of his last batch remained in the pouch. He spat at the ground, not in frustration, but due to a lack of words to properly describe his feelings.

The others came to, one by one, and not a word was spoken for nearly an hour. The others were clearly afraid the gunslinger would lapse into another fit of hysteria and snap their necks.

No such fit came. Instead, the gunslinger filled four cups full of water from one of his skins. He handed out a cup to each person before taking his own in-hand.

"I have suspected other forces at work since finding the doors, but now I know, that there is no doubt that _ka _is at play here. We are a group of people bounded by destiny."

He raised his cup, the others followed the example. "We are ka-tet. We are one from many."

Each of them felt something gently tug at the corners of their minds as they took in the water. Only Roland knew the true power of sharing _khef, _but he knew there would be plenty of time for his new friends to discover the powers of ka-tet.

Afterall, this was not the first time he had done this sort of thing. Somewhere on another level of the tower, a boy, his adopted parents, and the family dog all simultaneously shed a tear. None of them knew why, but they too felt the tugging-sensation at the corners of their mind. They were all at home, but they all felt the same feeling of sickness.

Then, like a feather in the wind, the feeling was gone.


	15. A2 Chapter 6

_The Men in Black – Le Casse Roi Russe_

The same moon that Alucard had stared at on the beach was now gazed upon by three men in the courtyard of an abandoned castle. Crumbled walls, rats, but no plants. Dust blew through the holes in the walls where bricks had given up and fallen away.

Around a fire sat the One Winged Angel, the Ageless Stranger, and the King of Evil. Their hoods had been pulled back from their faces, and the firelight danced upon their brows.

Sephiroth ran a hair lightly through his silver hair. "They've drawn the _dhampir _by now." Accompanied by his usual drone of apathy, Sephiroth managed to add extra distaste to the name of Alucard's species.

Somewhere in the night, a mixture of bird and lizard called out to the sky. None of the three men batted an eye. They knew very well the kind of creatures that lurked in the abyss of discordia.

"You said the monsters from the sea would eat them alive." The King of Evil glared at Walter accusingly. The old Sorcerer glanced at his dirty fingers and blew dust from their tips.

"Not to worry, my paranoid little King! Hee hee, that's quite the joke in itself! A King who serves under _the _King!"

The King of Evil glanced down at his balled fist. A cloud of purple energy flowed around it, the triforce on the back of his hand lighting up. He considered punching Walter in the face, right in his crooked nose, but he let it slide. The darkness crept away from his hand.

"And besides, they're approaching a thinny, or as you know them, a curtain of Twilight. Even if they make it through that, they have to get through the ruined city where our friend here-" he waved his hand toward Sephiroth as a circus master would introduce an act "-will be waiting for them. They will not survive that meeting."

The King of Evil looked around him to take his mind away from these trifling matters. He saw crumbled pillars, cracked cobblestone, and ragged carpets. The remainders of what once was.

He thought he could even see the spirits of the long-gone servants, still shuffling to and fro, their aim to ever please their King.

"As you both know, the Tower is getting far worse, thanks to the King's magnificent plans! The Heroes are locked away in agul siento while the Heartless devour their worlds. With the lifeforce of the worlds gone and nothing to power the beams, the Tower will fall. Nothing can undo what has been done. So relax, and enjoy the end of time."

Walter took a rather large bite out of his chicken leg. Juice ran down his chin, but he made no effort to wipe it. Sephiroth continued to look through the holes in the walls and into the discordia.

The King of Evil, who had been merely Ganondorf, King of Theives, before he took the triforce looked into a puddle of slime on the floor. The slime wasn't thick, and he saw his reflection. His bright yellow eyes and his orange hair seemed out of place in this dark world. _He _felt out of place here, but this was his ultimate dream.

Because as soon as the Tower falls, he won't be bowing to anyone any longer. He'll kill the Crimson King and rule over the darkness of eternity forever.

Ganondorf allowed a small laugh to escape his lips. Sephiroth glanced over at him. "Something funny?"

Ganondorf grinned madly. "No, nothing really. Nothing at all."

Sephiroth imagined shoving his sword through that grin and dangling Ganondorf over the discordia as his blood dripped into the void.


	16. Arc Three Chapter 1

Here it is at last, the beginning of Arc Three: Twilight and Sky. This is where _Legends _begins to heavily veer from the original Dark Tower series. Some will cry, some will perhaps write me strongly-worded reviews, and others will keep wanting more. If you want to read the original third installment of the DT series, look for Stephen King's _The Waste Lands_.

I hope you enjoy my work as much as I enjoy making it. Thank you to all the dedicated readers thus far, I appreciate your support. -Dylan Kennedy

* * *

_Ka-tet – The Gold Road_

Three men and a boy looked into a fire silently. Since their supper of deer meat and herbs, none of them have spoken a single word. This was completely understandable considering the day's events.

* * *

It had been nine o' the clock morning time. The gunslinger had brought the boy with him away from camp to see Link's skills in archery. He would not become a gunslinger, for that was not in his cards so to speak, but he _would _learn what could be taught about a gunslinger's instincts. As Roland's rough teacher, Cort, once said, "The gun does not make the man, maggots. The man makes the gun."

Roland had set up a few chunks of wood on top of some rocks about ninety yards away, something even fully grown male archers would groan and grumble at. If there was any fear in Link, his face did not show it.

Roland pointed to the chunks of wood. Though they were roughly the size of his hands put together, Link didn't even squint when he regarded them. The gunslinger took a step back from him and took a deep breath.

"Recite your prayer." Roland felt a powerful wave of déjà vu wash over him.

Link pulled his bow and notched an arrow, but did not pull it back. He began to speak, softly at first, "I do not aim with my hand; he who aims with his hand has forgotten the face of his father. I aim with my eye."

He began to get louder, "I do not shoot with my hand; he who shoots with his hand has forgotten the face of his father. I shoot with my mind."

Link was fully immersed into the oath, now screaming loud enough to make the gunslinger smile like the devil in a house of sinners, "I do not kill with my bow; he who kills with his bow has forgotten the face of his father. _I KILL WITH MY HEART!_"

His face alight with the joy of battle and the eyes of a killer, Link brought the bow up and rapidly fired three arrows, knocking each of the chunks down in succession. He loaded and shot in a remarkably fast blur, even the gunslinger's trained (and powerful) eyes had trouble registering all of the motion.

The boy lowered his bow and felt the gunslinger's hand fall onto his shoulder. "You spoke true, Link. Very true, and I am proud."

The look of a hardened warrior was once again replaced by boyish joy. "Am I a gunslinger now?"

Before either of them could speak further, they heard the sound of hundreds of trees falling and crashing into each other. Without a word, they both began sprinting back towards their camp site.

* * *

Cloud had been finishing his breakfast he heard the trees exploding and collapsing. He dropped his lobstrosity meat and stood up, looking toward the sounds. For a second or two he continued to see nothing.

In another blink, a sixty foot tall bear came charging out of the woods towards him. He almost went for his sword, then decided that the bear was too goddamn big for anything he's got access to, and began to frantically climb the tall elm tree behind him. The bear swiped at him, only succeeding in barely tapping the bottom of Cloud's monstrous sword.

The bear reared back and unleashed a monstrous sneeze, sending a cloud of white stuff into the air. Cloud was splattered.

"What the fuck! Get these off of me!" He was covered in small maggots and slugs, but he noticed they were dying rapidly after hitting the air, so he stopped swiping them and continued to climb. He looked down and noticed something strange.

The bear had a small radar dish on top of it's head, constantly swiveling, but in a tired jerkedy motion. Cloud thought he could knock it clean off with a swipe of his sword, but he wasn't willing to get close enough for that to happen. The bear's claws would tear him apart.

The bear was gaining on him now and he began to hear a cracking, tearing sound. The wood of this tree was strong and mighty, but not capable of holding the weight of a four ton cyborg bear filled with parasites and maggots.

Roland and Link arrived at the campsite, following the trail of destruction to the tree where Cloud had begun to ascend and abscond. Roland took Link by the shoulders and looked into his eyes.

"This is your real test. Do you see that spinning dish atop the bear's skull?" He loosed his grip so Link could turn and regard the dish. The boy saw it very well, his eyes were keen and the dish reflected the sun's glare easily. He didn't need to be told what to do, after all, he was used to the whole "magical weakspot" thing by this point in his life.

Link pulled back an arrow, thought twice, and pulled back a _different _arrow. Roland was surprised to see it explode into a ball of fire as it left Link's bow, knocking the dish off of the bear and simultaneously causing the bear to be engulfed in a fiery torrent. The cyborg fell from the tree and stumbled toward the sea, but the damage had been done. The mighty bear once known as Shardik fell into the shallow water and died, the parasites inside of him that caused his madness and deterioration followed suit.

Cloud descended from his tree, regarding the crack towards the bottom that would have made the tree give if the bear had held on much longer. He reached Roland and Link gesturing wildly to the bear.

"One of the ancient guardians of the beam, Shardik the Bear." Roland spoke with marvel as a monk would in referring to his god. "We must have disturbed his wood, but no matter now. His death won't prove to be pointless."

Alucard materialized in front of them, a strange mist coming into a person. "I heard some noise and _what the fuck is that_?" He pointed at the smoldering bear. Roland gave him a thin smile and waved his right hand in a "after you, good sir" motion. The four of them walked through the scar that Shardik had torn in the forest curtain.

Roland marveled at Shardik's size, walking the full length of him three times. Link stood off to the side, his face showed with indifference, but everyone knew he was celebrating on the inside. Cloud kicked the bear in the head and Alucard rolled his eyes. He still wanted to know more about this "guardian".

"Roland." The gunslinger looked up from examining the bear's scorched body. "You said this thing was ancient. How old are we talking here?

Roland smiled at them. "Oh, about a thousand years or so, I'd say. It's hard to know for sure, time has gotten a little…thin lately, as I'm sure you've begun to notice."

Cloud and Link gaped at the bear, both simultaneously shouting, "_A THOUSAND YEARS?_" Alucard seemed to be unimpressed. _A thousand may be impressive to you two, but I've already lived four hundred and I could easily do six hundred more_, he thought to himself.

Roland took his knife from its sheath and carved a small patch of un-scorched pelt from Shardik, depositing it into his purse. "I have been looking for you for ages, Shardik. You will lead me to my destiny."

Cloud crossed his arms. "You mean the Dark Tower is nearby?"

"Closer than it's ever been, at least for me. Come, we must follow his backtrail."

They followed Roland into the last trail of destruction Shardik the Guardian Bear ever left.


	17. A3 Chapter 2

_Ka-tet – Shardik's Clearing_

The four member's of Roland's ka-tet stood at the place where Shardik had broken out of his clearing into the thicket of lush evergreen trees. Link experienced tingles of déjà vu as memories of the Great Deku Tree came into his mind.

_The future depends upon thee, Link... Thou art courageous..._

Suddenly, it seemed like ages since he had been standing in front of the Great Deku Tree, that magnificent forest guardian of immense size and deep wisdom. Ages since he had received his destiny.

Of course, not even the Great Deku Tree could have foreseen the marring of that destiny, the events which lead Link to Termina, and eventually, to Mid-World. Link shook his head to clear the memories.

"Unpleasant memories?" Alucard raised an eyebrow and patted Link's head. "I'm familiar with the feeling."

Roland held up a finger to silence them and pointed forward in the direction of the clearing. Through their concealed spot in the thicket of broken trees and fallen leaves, the ka-tet watched the clearing's activity. Little robots of various shapes and sizes were moving about on century-old tasks. One robot, shaped like a small mechanical rat, had been moving in a perfect circle for so long that it had eroded a hole in the ground and was only visible when it leaped up from a short-circuit induced spasm.

"They must have been his, _its _caretakers." Cloud marveled. He noticed a concrete structure towards the other end of the clearing and swore he heard humming. He stepped out of the vantage point and screamed when a mechanical snake lunged at his leg. He kicked out of the air, hard, regretting the action instantly. As he bent down to nurse his bruised foot, three mechanical bats converged where his head had previously been. Roland drew his gun, Link his bow, and Alucard a throwing knife. They let fly with their weapons, Roland's gun punching a loud hole in the morning silence. The bats exploded into shrapnel over Cloud.

He stood up, but would not face the ka-tet. "Mechanical bats? Really? _Really?" _He charged into the clearing, drawing his sword, and lopped the nearest robot in half. The family dog-sized contraption stood no chance, it was cleaved clear in two. Oil spilled out onto the ground as it fell, down and out for the count as someone once said.

Cloud sheathed his sword, his rage now settled. He turned to Link, got down on one knee, and took the boy's shoulders. "I'm sorry man, you didn't need to see that. I mean, I know you said you fought monsters and some crazy red-headed guy but that was still too much for a kid your age."

Link smiled wide and shrugged. "It's okay Cloud." Alucard walked up and stopped next to them.

"But that makes twice today the child has saved the soldier. The debt piles onward, friend."

Cloud stood up and put on his signature smug grin. "Why don't you make like a tree-" he held his hands out to gesture at the surrounding wilderness "-and get the fuck out?" He jerked his thumb back to the entrance of the clearing. For a few seconds, nobody said anything. Then Alucard chuckled (the most they had gotten out of him humor-wise since he joined the party) and walked on. Link and Cloud stared at each other for a few moments before both of them burst out into gales of laughter.

The gunslinger, indifferent to the shenanigans of his ka-tet, was foraging in his purse for something. Every now and then he'd look at the trees directly ahead of him and then to the sky directly above him. Alucard watched this with mild amusement until Roland seemed to find what he was looking for: a small clay cup and a metal needle.

Alucard approached him, gesturing to the items. "What do you plan on doing with those?"

Roland began to fill the cup with water from his waterskin. "I've been searching for Shardik for a long time. Not because I wanted to slay him, that was an unfortunate part of this journey, but because the guardians hold a significant value to someone trying to find the Dark Tower."

Cloud and Link had now sat down next to where the gunslinger was crouching, eyeing his little setup with confusion. Roland continued, "There are twelve guardians total, each for a beam. The beams are magical forces the hold the Dark Tower – and all of existence – together. Since you stepped into this clearing, you've felt a slight pulling sensation, haven't you?"

The three of them all shared a look that seemed to say, _"HOW DID HE KNOW?"_

Roland graced them with a thin smile. "I thought so. That's because we're under the beam now. And all beams lead to the tower. They also lead to each other. For example, we are now on the path of the Bear. Opposite of Bear is Turtle, so if we walked around the world going in the reverse direction, we would end up at the Turtle. If we go in the forward direction, we will reach the Dark Tower, which is halfway toward the Turtle."

"Okay, that makes sense, but where exactly is this beam? What does it look like?"

Roland dropped the metal needle into his cup of water and held the cup out to them. The needle fell in sideways, then immediately turned and stopped, pointing to the area where Roland had been looking earlier. "The beam affects all things. This needle, the trees, even the cloud above you."

For a second, the others failed to see anything unusual. Then it all hit them and suddenly, they couldn't _unsee _it. All of the trees leaned up and inward just a little, in the direction the needle pointed. Above them, the clouds seemed to bend slightly as they passed over the beam.

Link jumped up and down with joy. "It's everywhere! I can see it and _IT IS EVERYWHERE!_"

Cloud was enjoying the sight when he began to hear the humming again, and this time he was sure he heard it. It was coming from the square concrete building about fifty yards back, down the path of the beam. He wandered over to it, the humming getting louder as he walked. The humming began to sound deranged, like the low babble of insanity often heard coming from patients in a mental asylum. He approached the steel door and put his head against it, listening to the inside. Two voices spoke to him. The first was a deep Gregorian Chant:

_Sempre aeternam tempus aedes_

Cloud would only recall the latter voice and its eerie message later around a fire. The encounter that would interrupt his recollections was, however, foreshadowed by the very origin of the first voice.


	18. A3 Chapter 3

_Ka-tet – The Gold Road_

Link throws the remainder of his meal, meat wrapped in leaves, into the fire. Sparks drift up lazily to the night sky. Behind them lies the forest and the beach from which they came, above them the beam, and in front of them lies their destiny.

At great length, of course.

Cloud went off to the side of the road for a personal thinking session. He couldn't seem to get Tifa and the thought of his unborn son out of his mind. _What should I name him? Will I even be there when he's born? I'm already a terrible father and he's not even born yet._

The gunslinger sat down next to him and rolled a smoke. "Thoughts of home?" He lit the cigarette with a match, casting the used up firestarter into the road after it had fulfilled its purpose. Cloud tried to wipe the emotion off of his face, and did a poor job at that. "No. Just thinking. Can't a guy just sit and think?"

Roland took a long drag and blew a few smoke rings into the air. "A man who knows the truth can think himself into falsehood, Cloud."

"Well what is that supposed to mean?"

"It means nothing to a man that thinks about nothing."

Cloud glared at the gunslinger. "Whenever you speak in riddles it makes me want to punch you."

"Good. Thinking about punching me is better than thinking about nothing. You can use anger, you can't use nothing."

With that, the gunslinger rose and returned to the campfire. Cloud seethed in the darkness, opening and closing his fists slowly. He began to hear Tifa's voice in his head.

_Dilly dally shmilly shmally. Calm yourself, Cloud. He's just trying to help._

"I know," he replied, unaware that he was thinking aloud. "He just gets me so _angry _sometimes."

_Good. I like you better when you're angry. You're much less pathetic that way._

That was not Tifa. Cloud flew to his feet and drew his sword, everyone in the camp turned to him. "Where are you Sephiroth?"

_I'm in your head, because I am you. Without you, I wouldn't exist at all. The darkness in you makes me exist, and you'll always have darkness Cloud. You can't escape from that._

"_I'M NOT THE ONE WHO'S RUNNING, SEPHIROTH! COME OUT AND FIGHT YOU FUCKING COWARD!"_

_Soon enough Cloud. Soon enough._

A melody began to drift over from the campfire. It drowned Sephiroth's voice down until it was gone. Cloud dropped his sword, fell to his knees, and began to weep in the road as the notes entered his mind and washed pain down his face.

Link was standing in front of the fire, facing Cloud, and playing his Ocarina.

Cloud looked up at him as he gently swayed back and forth, playing notes of soothing sound. "It's so…beautiful. The song is _so fucking beautiful_."

Alucard walked over and retrieved Cloud's sword, silently marveling at its immense weight. Even for a dhampir, the thing was still wondrously heavy. Cloud tears created dark spots on the road as he let the pain fall out of him.

Link finished the song and looked down at Cloud who stared back at him with wet eyes. A small smile formed on Cloud's face. "Thank you…Link. That song just… it made the voices go away. It took away my pain, man. It was…"

"It was the Song of Healing. I learned it in a place called Termina. It takes pain out of people's hearts." Link put his Ocarina away and approached Cloud. For a moment, they remained there, one on the ground and the other standing. Cloud looked up at him and Link down. The boy held out his hand and Cloud took it, rising to his feet. Alucard handed him the Buster Sword and Cloud strapped it to his back.

The gunslinger watched all of this from the side of the fire, smiling at his ka-tet. He tried to remember a time when he had felt so proud of another person, as proud as he was of Link, and had difficulty doing so. His love for the boy grew tenfold that night as Link played his heart out on the Ocarina and healed Cloud's torment.

At least he had healed it for now, but that night was not the last they would see of Sephiroth's grip on Cloud. The next time they would deal with it, the Song of Healing wouldn't be enough, and they would receive help from a key from another world.

But for now, all was well. Cloud went to sleep that night without any pain in his heart. Roland slept, proud of what was becoming his adopted son. Alucard would stare off into the night long after Link fell asleep and dreamed of the key.

* * *

_Link looks around and finds that he is on a beach. He is standing waist-deep in the sea water and in front of him is a small island filled with tropical foliage and a series of wooden tree forts. A boy with brown spikey hair is kicking what appears to be a blue and white studded beach ball around in the sand with another young man. The second one has spikey blonde hair, not unsimilar to Cloud's, and appears to be a little older than the first boy. The first boy turns to Link and beckons with his hand in the "Come here!" manner._

_Link trudges through the surf and approaches the two boys. The first boy is wearing a necklace with a metal crown on it, his clothes are full of zippers, and his shoes are humongous. The second boy has shorts with one leg longer than the other and a gauntlet on one arm._

"_The key to his pain is the key to his heart," says the first boy._

"_The key comes through the door, the door opens with its twin," says the second._

"_Wait, what does any of this mean?" Link asks. He begins to feel himself being pulled away, back into the ocean._

"_See you soon, little hero," says both of the boys as they wave a temporary goodbye._

* * *

Link awoke to the sound of a wolf's howl from down the Gold Road.


	19. A3 Chapter 4

_Ka-tet – The Gold Road_

Roland smoked a cigarette as he poked the remains of the campfire with a stick. Cloud sat next to him, silent with a blank expression on his face. Alucard was still sleeping (he tended to sleep a little longer than the others due to his nocturnal nature), and Link had gone into the woods to pass water.

Link came out of the tree line, his business finished and started walking back to the road. He pointed at Alucard and Roland nodded back, signaling that it was okay to wake him up now. "Did anyone else hear that wolf last night?" Link shouted over to the camp. "I was having this weird dream and it woke me up. Seriously, it came out of no-" he stopped walking.

Down the road, right in the middle, was a wolf. A lone wolf, to please the pun-lovers. A single shackle was closed around his left forepaw with a few bits of chain still attached.

Roland's hand fell to the butt of his gun, but he did not draw. Cloud looked at the wolf with disinterest and Alucard was barely waking. Link turned to face the wolf head-on and expected an attack, his hands more than ready to pull the sword and shield that would be any enemy's demise.

The wolf did not charge. It merely sat there. Link called out to it, "What do you want, wolf?"

The wolf howled in response. At first, Link thought nothing of it. The wolf repeated the howl again, and Link's mouth began to plummet towards the ground.

The wolf was howling a song. Not just any song, but a song that made Link's eyes swell with tears of homesickness. The wolf was howling the very song Link used to play to summon his horse, Epona. The wolf was actually howling the notes to Epona's Song perfectly.

Link pulled out his Ocarina. "Okay wolf, that was good, but this is the real test. Can you follow me?" _That feels incredibly weird to say. Usually I'm the one being taught songs…_

Link put his lips to the Ocarina and began to play his signature tune, the one that has sealed his fate time and time again. The same one that would seal it again on this very day, adding another member to the ka-tet. Link played the Song of Time once slowly, then again at normal speed along side the wolf's howling. Alucard rose up and admired the scene unfolding before him: a boy and a wolf making music in the road, the morning light shining down upon them.

Link finished the song and put away his instrument, beckoning for the wolf to approach, which it did. He led the wolf back to camp and introduced his new friend to his other friends.

"Look guys, I've got a wolf," he beamed at them.

"It would appear so," replied the gunslinger, casually throwing the remaining stub of his cigarette into the fire.

"Can we keep him? Please please please _PLEASE!_" shouted the boy.

Cloud decided to talk. "After that spectacle, it would be pretty cold to say no to the kid at this point."

Roland shrugged his shoulders and held out his hands, palms up, as if to say, "Let it be so, then."

Link jumped into the air and pumped a fist for victory. Alucard reached out a hand and petted the wolf's head without any sign of caution. _You and I are not so different, wolf. Perhaps I'll talk to you as an equal sometime._

Roland fed the wolf a piece of jerky from his purse. "What shall we call you?"

Link brightened up, it seemed he had an idea. Before he could say anything, he lost it, and he sat down with a look of puzzled confusion. Alucard offered no suggestions to the table, he merely sat and regarded the patterns on the wolf's forehead.

Cloud looked the wolf dead in the eyes. "Your name shall be Nanaki."

A smile returned to the boy's face. "That's a nice name, I like the way it sounds."

Cloud sat back, proud to receive praise for such an obvious (at least to himself) suggestion. "That name belonged to an old friend of mine. I can hardly remember the last time I saw him, already it seems like a lifetime has passed."

Roland rose to his feet and nodded to the road. "We should get going, 'the sun doesn't stop for memories' as my old teacher used to say."

They kicked out their campfire and proceeded down the Gold Road with their new friend trotting alongside them. The wolf would often look at the boy and Roland noticed something strange about that look. By the time he had found the correct way to explain it, many things would have happened. Ah yes, many things would be explained and there wouldn't be a need to describe that look.

But those things wouldn't happen for quite some time, so you needn't concern yourself with them yet.

Right now, just picture the ka-tet walking down a tired, old road of hardened dirt. Trees line the sides and a magical beam lies in the sky, bending everything around it to its will. The trees tip ever so slightly in its direction, the shadows try to fall underneath it, and even the clouds find themselves drawn in. The ka-tet traveled underneath this for a few days before happening upon something that should not be. A book on the wrong shelf, a dish in the wrong cupboard.

Roland had heard many stories about thinnys before actually seeing one during one of his adventures (an adventure which will be covered on another day, dear reader) but he had never heard anything about this golden veil that now stood before him. A golden curtain from the ground up to the sky's vast limits blocked the way forward.

He looked up and noticed that the beam seemed to cut a small hole around the curtain to allow itself to pass through. The wolf had gotten antsy since they saw the curtain, and now the wolf was growling and his fur was standing on edge. Link heard a whisper in his mind: _twilight._

"It's a curtain of Twilight," he said aloud, not conscious that he was speaking.

Alucard threw a dagger into it and was slightly relieved to see it sail right through. "Well, it would appear that things can go through it, so at least we're not at a total loss. Now comes the question: proceed or abscond?"

Link kneeled down to the wolf, rubbing his side in an attempt to calm him. "I know you don't like this thing, whatever it is, but I don't really want to just leave you. I can't really explain why you know Epona's Song or why you have blue earrings like I did when I was a grownup, but there's something about you that makes me want to keep you close. So will you go in with us? Please Nanaki?"

Nanaki stopped growling and relaxed his body. He still seemed to dislike the idea of going into the curtain of Twilight, but he would not leave the boy's side. If that meant going through, then so be it.

Cloud chuckled to himself. "Brave, just like my Nanaki. I miss you buddy, wherever you are."

Roland looked at each member of his tet. "I want everyone to link hands. Link, just grab Nanaki's fur, I'm sure he'll understand. I've never seen one of these before, but if it's anything like a thinny, I'd rather us not get too separated. Reality gets, well, _thin_ in those. This curtain of Twilight probably isn't any different. Let's go now, all at once."

The ka-tet linked hands, and Link grabbed some of Nanaki's fur as he was told. If the wolf was offended or hurt, he didn't show it as they walked into the curtain of Twilight.


	20. A3 Chapter 5

_Ka-tet – Inside the Curtain of Twilight_

They all cringed as they entered the curtain, expecting horrible pain or perhaps even death. Neither of these things happened, but a sullenness drooped over the party like a continuous rain. The Twilight all around them seemed to pay obvious homage to its name, as they world appeared to be locked in the perpetual twilight of sunsets. Nanaki seemed to be affected the least by the curtain's power.

"I love the night and I can deal with the day, but this is just…bluh," said Alucard as he kicked some of the dirt on the ground.

The boy mimicked him, kicking some dirt with his right boot. "I think I'd be okay if it wasn't for all the floating things. They look like little black squares and it's _really weird._"

Nobody noticed it, but Nanaki's lips pulled up in a small smile.

Cloud was unusually silent about the whole experience. The other members of the ka-tet kept expecting him to make a bunch of snide remarks about the situation, but he said very little during their first day in the curtain. Roland took silent notice of this and made a point to have some entertainment, be it riddles or stories or songs, at the night's campfire.

As it turned out, things _did _happen around the campfire, but very few people would find it entertaining. Certainly none of the ka-tet would, but perhaps another ka-tet. We will speak of the campfire and of the other ka-tet later, but for now, our focus must return to the first day's journey in the Twilight.

"You really don't know anything about this thing, Roland?" asked Link.

"No, not at all. It's a little like something called a thinny, but beside the wavy wall, the similarities thin out quite a bit."

Link stifled a giggle. The gunslinger became extremely confused.

"What did I-"

"You spoke of something called a "thinny" and then said that the similarities were "thin". You made a pun and it is destroying the child," Alucard explained.

Link's boyish laughter flowed from his face in great waves, easing the sullenness of the party for a few precious moments. It was hours after entering the Twilight and the first time any of them had felt good since then. The laughter wasn't entirely a good thing, however, because they all missed something while enjoying the moment.

A flicker of moment, darting of shapes in a land without shadow. Heartless morph up from the ground and attack the party. Roland's guns play their death song, and although it sounds a bit sharp in the Twilight, the result is the same. Link pulls his gear and leaps forward to take one down. As each one falls, another two come in to take its place. The attack is seemingly endless and the ka-tet becomes aware of it. A heartless manages to tackle Nanaki and claw his body, but a massive swipe from the Buster Sword rips it off before real damage is done. He begins walking over to the wolf when a terrible pain grips his head. The others fail to notice him as he falls to his knees, only did they know something was wrong by the way he began to grip his head and scream in agony.

"Roland! Something's wrong with Cloud!" Link yelled as he hacked another foe.

"We can't do anything for him while these-" Alucard kicks a heartless in the face, knocking it's small metal helmet off of its head "- stupid things are attacking."

"_GET DOWN!" _Link lobbed a bomb into the swarm of incoming heartless and dropped to the dirt. Roland and Alucard fell simultaneously as shrapnel tore up the air around them. There were no more heartless, but Cloud was now writhing on the ground.

"Get out of my head…"

_No, I very much like it here Cloud. The darkness in you is just so…refreshing._

"I'm…I'm not like that."

_Not like what? Not a worthless guilt-ridden, washed up hero? You're useless. You can't even raise your own child, how sad._

"_YOU SHUT UP ABOUT MY FUCKING SON!"_

_Make me._

"_ARRRGH I'M GONNA KILL YOU SEPHIROTH!"_

The rest of the ka-tet watched Cloud scream at himself but couldn't bear to do so any longer. Roland slapped Cloud clean across the face. Cloud looked around, dazed. It all flowed back into him at once, Nanaki being tackled and then being…intruded.

"I'm sorry guys. I'm really losing it, aren't I?" He looked down at the ground in shame.

Link sheathed his sword and strapped his shield in place. He sat down next to Cloud and put a friendly arm around his back. "It's okay Cloud, I think we can fix it. I never did tell you guys about my dream from the other night, did I?"

They shook their heads. "Okay, well I was on this beach…" and Link proceeded to tell the rest of his dream, omitting not a single detail. By the time he was done, everyone had sat down. Roland scratched the fuzz on his face, surely the prequel of a beard if left untended another day, trying to make sense of the story.

"It seems as though you'll be seeing more of them, I don't doubt that." Cloud wanted to laugh from the usual old Roland, "No imagination, so he points out the obvious!" he'd say. But he was still shooken up, and so, he said nothing. Silence felt just fine to him.

Alucard merely cared his look of uncomfort that he had donned since entering the Twilight.

"I don't know what their names are," Link began. "But I know that I'll see them again, and if I'm lucky, maybe I can meet them. They sounded really cool."

Nanaki howled into the sky and no one interrupted his song. After all, it helped fill the empty void of noiselessness that lingered within the Curtain of Twilight.


	21. A3 Chapter 6

_Ka-tet – Inside the Curtain of Twilight_

There they traveled for three days, finding small interruptions between the Twilight and the real world. The ka-tet appreciated these small "breaks" as the Twilight was having strong effects on all of them, Cloud being the most affected of all. Whatever was going on in his mind seemed to intensify while he was within the Twilight.

Though they did not know it yet, it was due to very powerful magic that they weren't turned into spirits every time they entered. They encountered such spirits on the last day of their trek through the Curtains.

The Gold Road was coming to an end and a small town lied ahead of them. As they took their first steps into the town, they noticed many balls of light floating in the air. Some moved about, others stayed fairly still.

"What are they, Roland?" asked Link.

"Spirits," Alucard answered. "Despite this pounding headache, I can sort of see them when I concentrate. Some of them are mumbling, it looks like. Hmmm. Can't really hear them."

Nanaki could. He could see them too, so he listened in on a nearby spirit while the others watched.

"Why is it so dark? Where'd the sun go? And why are there monsters every other day? This is a nightmare…"

He listened to another: "I haven't seen my wife since it got dark and the monsters showed up. I wonder if she…oh man."

Same story generally all around. All of the spirits were that of elderly folks, one woman in particular looked to be more than a century old.

"Can't we help them? I feel bad leaving them like this." Link kicked the ground lightly to vent his frustration.

"I don't think there is a way. The best thing we can do is to move forward and perhaps, we'll find an answer to these Curtains. But for now, we move forward."

The ka-tet offered no rebuttle to the gunslinger's order and moved out of the town just as the sun set in the real world. Another mile of dirt road followed by a bridge was ahead of them, but that would be for the next day's trek. Their heads throbbed, their feet ached, and they all needed some rest.

Cloud's demeanor had gotten increasingly depressing since first entering the Curtains. He didn't seem to be getting _worse _since they were out, but he was decidedly silent as they sat around the campfire that night. When the maddening voice in his head quieted for brief periods of time, he would think of home. When he thought of home, he thought of Tifa. When he thought of Tifa, he thought of their baby. He had gotten very close to Link lately, thought of him almost as a little brother, and thought he might name his own child after him. At the least, he wanted his child to be like Link. Full of strength and courage, with a clear sense of justice and love for others. That would be, of course, if he ever saw home again.

* * *

Down the road, across the ruined bridge, and inside of a concrete jungle was another campfire. Around it sat a ka-tet, but not of the White. They were very much aligned with the Red and their main squeeze was death. In the High Speech, the word _char _stands for death, and so, we shall call this group of villains the char-tet.

Their leader was obviously the wizard known as Walter o' Dim, also known Marten Broadcloak, also known as Randall Flagg. Randall Flagg, normally the sourest grape of any infected vine, was not so much more evil than this particular band of badguys. After all, the One Winged Angel stood amongst their ranks. Sephiroth, the demon that had brought Cloud's homeworld of Gaia to it's knees _twice _was the same one driving him insane as he sat around the other campfire. Another member of the char-tet was a man from the Gerudo Desert in Hyrule. This man was none other than Ganondorf, the King of Evil.

"They should have died in the Curtain of Twilight, and yet, they still exist."

Randall Flagg did nothing but giggle at the King. "I could have told you that they'd survive. Each one of them is protected by some power or another. Roland has the White, your boy has that piece of the triforce, Cloud has that freaky lifestream stuff in his body, and the dhampir is protected solely by the powerful will of his father. If all goes to plan tomorrow, he will never get to enjoy a family reunion with dear daddy, hee hee hee!"

Sephiroth turned his eyes over to the wizard. _I'm going to enjoy killing you one day, Flagg. It may come sooner than you think._

* * *

Roland had a long thinking session that night. He first thought about the Curtains.

_Why were they there, and more importantly, who created them? I have heard much about this world, surely not all there is to know, but this seemed like something that might warrant quiet talks in barrooms. Perhaps the tower is worse than I previously thought._

"Perhaps it is."

Roland snapped forward and looked around him. He was thinking to himself, not a single word was uttered. Cloud was fast-asleep and Alucard was off in the night, likely hunting. Which leaves Link, who sat upon his bed roll as surprised as Roland was. He cupped his hands over his mouth.

"How long have you been able to do that, Link?"

"…I don't know. Sometimes I hear bits and pieces of what everyone's thinking but I'm really not listening for it or wearing masks or anything I swear!"

Roland leaned back on his elbows and smiled at the sky. "Then it is like I thought, you are gifted in the Touch, just like my old friend Alain was. Alright Link, I need to be serious when I tell you this, you must only use that power for good, do you understand?"

Link nodded quietly.

"But you must also understand that sometimes, things that seem bad can also be good. This is why I need you to listen to Cloud's thoughts."

Link looked at Cloud hurriedly and back to Roland. "What? That would be horrible! It would be wrong for me to listen, let alone tell you what they were, which is exactly where this is going."

Roland's face hardened. "Link, Cloud is in danger. To the extent of which I can only imagine. What if he goes mad? What if what he's hearing could give us some kind of foresight? You must listen and report any important things to me."

Link seemed apprehensive, but he gave in. "Okay, but I'm only listening three times a day! Okay?"

Roland nodded his head. "That is fine."

_Great, now I'm a thought thief. Thanks Roland._


	22. A3 Chapter 7

_Ka-tet – The Bridge_

It was monstrous.

None of the party had ever seen a bridge so large in their lives. They all stood at the place where dirt road met metal struts and cracked asphalt, gaping at the sight. The ruined city lay beyond them was nothing to them, not even the off-white balls of energy that floated in the air towards it caught their eyes.

Roland finished his internal praise first and spoke to awaken the party, "This was a fine bridge at one time, surely built by the Great Ones themselves. But those days are gone and now it lies in ruin.

Cloud looked over the edge and noticed that they were about to cross a bridge that lies more than a hundred feet off of a chasm with a small river running through the middle. If they were to fall…

Well, game over, your party dies and you gain no experience.

"Well the middle looks crumbly, but those metal walkways on the side look pretty intact," Link pointed out.

And so, without any debate, the ka-tet began to cross the bridge via the walkway. When they were nearly halfway across, they noticed that they would have had to take this path anyway; there was an entirely collapsed section of the road that would have made crossing impossible. Though none of them would admit to a fear of heights, the humans all clung to the side a little bit more through this section. Nanaki walked on stoically as if he could walk along the air itself, need be. Nanaki even failed to hesitate when they crossed back to the road via a single I-beam. Link, who had been the last person to cross, waited excitedly while Nanaki came to him.

"You're a bra-"

His boot slipped as he jumped for joy. He lost them in the air and tumbled downward. Roland looked over just in time to see the boy's boots go over the edge. Time slowed down for him, at least it seemed to in those moments, and he urged his body to move faster than it could. The gunslinger ran at the edge screaming Link's name. He shoved a fist into his purse and took out a section of rope. Like a bounty hunter's lasso for his target, it flew down the hole with unimaginable speed. His rope met nothing and the gunslinger began to have terrible thoughts.

Cloud's scream cut through the air, sending shivers up his spine.

"_YOU! SEPHIROTH!"_

Floating in the air was the One Winged Angel, holding an unconscious Link in one hand and his sword, Masamune, in the other.

"You don't even have to tell me what you cherish anymore, Cloud. You seal all your love into the blackest pit of your heart for me to see."

Cloud's sword was in his hands. "Put him down, you don't need him."

Sephiroth turned his head down a little and slightly, ever so slightly, raised an eyebrow. "You're right, I don't. But someone else here does. Come into the city if you think you can save him, Cloud. Bring your little friends, we'll have a family reunion for a useless excuse for a father like you."

Sephiroth disappeared in a wormhole of purple and black energy. Before anything could be said, the gunslinger and Cloud took off toward the city. Not at all concerned at covering up all of his powers, Alucard changed into a wolf and ran alongside Nanaki.

"_We have to save Link or we'll never fix anything!" _said Nanaki. Alucard thought it strange that Nanaki's voice would sound so…familiar. He heard what other people heard as barks and growls as words, even with a human accent. This was not new, however, and thus that half of the situation didn't particularly amuse him.

"_What do you mean "fix it" Nanaki? What the hell are you talking about?"_

They leaped over a pile of twisted metal as the humans had done just seconds before. The spirits were intensifying in number and some of them were flying along right beside the wolves. _"This world is not mine, nor is it yours I'm assuming. This is all messed up and the Tower is the only way to fix it, to restore the pieces of the worlds back to their cores."_

None of this was making any sense to Alucard at the moment, but he asked no questions and bade no reply.

"_Oh, and my name's not Nanaki. I don't care if you want to call me that, but I just figured you should know that my name is Link."_


	23. A3 Chapter 8

_The Boy – Zanarkand_

The boy's eyes opened slightly and he didn't particularly care for the sight in front of him. He was tied to a pole, dangling 30 feet above the ground. Down on the ground stood three men, each as evil as the one next to him. There was some man in a hooded cloak, the demon that captured him, and…

_No. No no no no no no no. Anybody but him._

"The boy is awake I see, hee hee hee!" tittered the cloaked man. He spun around on his heels and pointed up at Link. "Your friends will be here soon to rescue you. And the best part of this plan is that you'll get to watch them die before we teleport you off to Agul Siento! How nice for you, feel free to send me a thank you letter when you have the chance. I don't think now is a very good time, because you look a little tied up! Tee hee hee!"

Link applied every inch of his power and will in an attempt to burst free from his bindings, but he found no success. He was stuck until help arrived.

Randall Flagg raised his hands to the city around him. "Look well boy, this is Zanarkand, the place where all dead spirits on Spira go. Thanks to the dimensional rifts opening up, the place your friend the gunslinger knew is getting pieces from other worlds fused right into it! Oh, the traveling you could have done."

_I know you're coming Roland. You won't let me fall again…_

But not all of the voices in the boy's head agreed with that.

* * *

Roland and Cloud came to a stop at a crossroads. Alucard changed back to his regular form and came to a stop next to them. Nanaki skidded to a stop and shoved his nose into the dirt. He sniffed a couple of spots before turning to the left and running under some collapsed buildings. Roland and Cloud followed, ducking and weaving the whole way.

They followed Nanaki into a huge open area where some sort of arena used to be. Roland saw his nemesis standing next to Cloud's demon and some sort of evil prince or perhaps even a king. "Return the boy, Walter. You might not live another day if you force me to take him back from you."

Walter laughed and threw back his hood, revealing his long faded hair and sharp teeth. "Hile gunslinger! You look a little different from the last time I saw you. Is it your hair, or is it the gaping hole where your left eye used to be?"

Roland's guns were in his hands before Walter could finish laughing. The wizard spoke to him, "Oh now now, that simply will not do Roland. Oh and please, call me Randall Flagg. You've already met Sephiroth here, and over to his left is a man known to your boy as the King of Evil! Perhaps there can be two kings to rule the Tower?"

Even though this was all in good fun for Randall, he almost found it difficult to admit such a false statement. Of course there couldn't be two kings, he was just using Ganondorf to get rid of Roland's most powerful weakness.

Roland starting pulling the triggers of his guns, but the only noise they made were clicks. He opened the cylinders and checked the bullets. "No sense in trying to shoot duds at me, gunslinger," cooed Flagg. _Of course, he's a wizard. My guns are useless to me against him._

Alucard noticed a glare of sunlight from behind Flagg. A pair of sunglasses on a hardened face, missing an eye like Roland. "No sense using magic on a weapon from another world, sorcerer," said Auron as he swung his katana down at Flagg. The sorcerer turned into mist, copying Alucard's skill, and reappeared ten feet away.

"Tell me "guardian", why do you continue to exist after your time is up?"

"Because he's not done yet, and I'm just getting warmed up myself!" The blonde-haired boy from Link's dream cut the wizard across the bag with his sword. Flagg shrieked and disappeared into a portal of darkness. Heartless began to appear from all sides and the two newcomers fell back to the ka-tet. They formed a circle with Cloud at the front, standing directly across from Sephiroth.

"Go on Ganondorf, this is too much darkness for your power-hungry heart to deal with. I'll bring the boy with me later."

"Hmph!" growled Ganondorf as he walked back into a portal and disappeared. Cloud began to walk forward at Sephiroth, not faltering even as the Heartless began to close in on them.

Sephiroth held up a hand. "He's mine." The Heartless backed off of Cloud and converged onto the ka-tet. Roland ducked down and began to reload his revolvers as Alucard drew his sword. The newcomers charged forward, swords swinging. Nanaki ran around the mob and began to work his way over to Link.

Cloud held his sword up and blocked a downblow from the Masamune. He broke the guard and swiped at Sephiroth. The One Winged Angel slid back and unleashed a flurry upon Cloud, who began stepping back towards a wall as he fended off the blows.

The newcomers went back to back as the fat Heartless approached. The younger of the two pointed at one as he spoke, "Their backs are the weakpoint. This is tons more exciting than fighting fiends, eh Auron?"

"Shut up Tidus." Auron replied as he dove forward and elbowed the Heartless in front of him.

Alucard parried a claw swipe and stabbed a Heartless in the eye. The gunslinger stood next to him firing his revolvers in two directions, cutting down Heartless on both sides.

Cloud lunged at Sephiroth a second too late. His sword was shoved to the side and he received a stab through the torso from the Masamune. "You just never get it, do you Cloud? You're weak and you always will be."

He raised his sword up and Cloud with it. Blood dripped from his chest and down the blade, forming a pool around the guard of the Masamune. Cloud looked at him and gave a small smile. He gripped the blade in his free hand and began to pull himself down the sword to Sephiroth.

"I'm only as weak as I let myself be."

A laser came down from the sky and punched a hole through Sephiroth's wing. He pulled his sword out of Cloud and recoiled back. In the sky was an enormous airship firing down at him. He fell back through a portal as the ship's owner let a ladder roll down. "C'mon, before those bastard Heartless overrun you guys! Hurry your shit up!" The owner was a blonde man in his late thirties with a pair of goggles across his forehead. The cigarette in his mouth burned brightly for a moment as he dragged on it.

The ship shot the rope tying Link to the pole and he fell. Nanaki arrived in time to break the boy's fall, not currently caring how bad it hurt his back. The gunslinger screamed, _"THE LADDER! ON ME!" _as he sprinted through the crowd. Tidus and Auron followed behind him, intercepting oncoming Heartless. Alucard stepped off a Heartless' head and grabbed the ladder. After he was up, Link began to climb. He looked around after the first step and saw the wolf.

_How is he supposed to climb this?_

Thinking quickly, he pulled out the Hookshot from his satchel. He pressed the first button and fired the hook at a Heartless. It exploded it's target into black smoke and fell to the ground. Nanaki glanced at the hook at at Link, putting the pieces together.

He bit the hook and looked at Link. They understood each other, and so, Link began to climb the ladder with rapid pace, the chain of his Hookshot extending as he climbed. When he reached the ship he hit the other button, pulling the wolf aboard with intense speed.

The gunslinger followed up the ladder and called down to Auron and his friend. "With haste swordsmen!"

Tidus looked up at the gunslinger and winked. "We'll cover your escape and catch up to you later! Go on!"

The airship's owner gave not a second thought and flew the ship away from Zanarkand before any of the ka-tet could protest.


	24. A3 Chapter 9

**AN: **You'll meet another character of mine in this chapter. He's an OC I created for an FFVII DnD campaign, and I really like him. I jokingly refer to him as Solid Cid, due to his character being _heavily _influenced by Solid Snake and Cid Highwind. At any rate, I hope you like him. I've got irons in the fire, reader, and more to come. Thanks for staying with me thus far. -Dylan Kennedy

* * *

_Ka-tet – Aboard the Highwind_

The members of the ka-tet tried not to look down at the city below them, now swarming with Heartless, but they couldn't stop themselves. Even worse, they noticed that the Heartless were all heading to the arena where Tidus and Auron decided to stay.

Cid broke the silence as he piloted the ship, "I told them it was a bad idea, but some people can't be reasoned with. They said the aerial Heartless would tear my ship apart if they weren't fighting them. Hah, like a few shitheaded imps can pierce this hull."

Cloud put a hand on Cid's shoulder. "Thanks for the rescue, Cid. Where have you been lately? It seemed like after the geostigma was cured, you just vanished."

Cid lit a cigarette and inhaled deeply. He blew the smoke to the side before replying, "Well you see, I heard there was some inventor that looked exactly like me in Midgar. Guy thinks he's cool because he smokes those shitty cigars instead of cigarettes. Bah, fuck him. At any rate, he actually agreed to help me develop some new tech for the Highwind here."

"What was the guy's name and why isn't he here?"

"Oh, he's here." And as if to prove that point, a grumbly voice came through the intercom.

"Excuse me, Captain Fuckwit, but there's a shitton of enemies coming this way. Not Heartless, either. These are the white ones."

"Nobodys," Alucard muttered to himself. He was standing against a control station in a casual slouch, the pose of the dark and mysterious everywhere. Cid turned his head up to Cloud and jerked a thumb at the dhampir. "Who's that guy? Vincent's long lost brother or something?"

Alucard looked dead on at Cid. "Who is Vincent?"

Cloud looked out the window and noticed a crowd of Nobodys flying towards them. They all had one wing that appeared to be attached to their bodies by a zipper. "He's a dark brooding type, like you. A person of the night, if you will."

_Oh, so the ruse has failed. I shouldn't have expected it to work forever._

"So then you've figured out that I'm not human."

The gunslinger turned his eye over to the ongoing interaction. He had suspected this not long after Alucard joined his party, but to see it was true still surprised him. Vampires were things of legend, and yet, one stood before him.

"It makes no difference to me, Alucard. I don't care what you are, just don't drink my blood or something while I'm sleeping." Cloud picked up his sword from the corner and made for the door.

Alucard stopped him when he spoke, "Only half vampire, my mother was a human. My father…well, that's a story for another day."

The intercom interjected again, "I can hear everything, and it's really nice that all of you are having some family bonding and personal revelations, but we're about to get steamfucked into a pair of shitstorm pants if you don't go outside and take care of the Nobodys."

Cid chuckled and put his cigarette out. "Tristan's got quite a mouth on him, doesn't he Cloud?"

"Yeah, like you, old man."

Cid started screaming about how he should never be compared to a "psychotically obsessed tinkerer" when the ka-tet left the flight deck.

* * *

Dearest reader, I must say that I'm suddenly compelled to describe the Highwind to you. I beg that you'd listen to me, and very well at that.

The Highwind is propelled by propellers (as opposed to jet turbines), but due to the sheer number of these, the aircraft is capable of moving at relatively fast speeds. The color of the aircraft is mostly steel-grey, with a picture of "Lady Luck" (a nearly naked blonde woman with hearts over her nipples, surrounded by playing cards) near the flight deck. The Highwind itself looks something like a long airplane with a small boat-like platform attached below the main fuselage. This small structure serves as the landing dock and observation deck.

In our story, a lone man stood on the observation deck fighting the Nobodys. He was a man in his late thirties with dirty blonde hair and hazel eyes. The tails of his green bandana flapped in the wind behind him as he battled for the ship.

Roland opened the door in time to marvel at the elegance of Tristan's weapon, the Boom Lance. It appeared to be a swordstaff, something he had seen in the armory of Gilead, but the end of the staff section looked different.

Tristan raised the end of the staff up and pulled a trigger hidden in the middle of the staff. A fierce boom split the air and the Nobody he aimed at was hit by 00 buckshot.

_So it has a scatter rifle built into it. Very clever, inventor._

Tristan turned to face the ka-tet. "Keep them from hitting the propellers or we'll be be crashing-landing into that squirming mass of Heartless."

Not needing to be told twice, they joined the action. Roland prioritized his attacks to airborne Nobodys near the engines and propellers. Cloud found himself teaming up with Link, cutting through Nobodys and smashing them down with his Buster Sword. The boy had his sword and shield up, fighting harder than he had since his confrontation with the evil spirit Majora.

A Nobody went into a dive, aimed at Tristan's back. Link dashed forward and slammed his shield into it as hard is he could, bouncing the foe away and overboard. He noticed another group of them coming their way and his mind hatched an idea. The boy pulled a bomb out from his satchel and tied it to an arrow with some string. He lit the fuse and fired the arrow at the group of Nobodys.

The gunslinger saw this and fired his last shot at the bomb right before it hit the group. The resulting carnage made all who bared witness laugh uproariously. Unfortunately, laughing tends to be distracting, and as such, the gunslinger found claws tearing into his right leg.

He fell to the deck and kicked the Nobody off of him, dropping his revolvers in the process. The ship swayed hard and his guns scooted inches away from the edge of the deck. Two daggers flew over him as he scrambled for his guns, obliterating the Nobody that took him down. He got a hand around one of the pistols, but the other tipped and fell. He made a wild grab for it and felt himself fall for a second when something closed around his left leg.

Teeth, but friendly teeth. Nanaki tried not to puncture the gunslinger's other leg, but he found it hard to keep him from falling without increasing the pressure of his hold. Roland held onto his guns tightly as he was slowly pulled back onto the deck. The Nobodys were gone, the battle won for now.

The gunslinger winced at the pain in _both _of his legs, but he petted the wolf's head anyway. "You've saved my life Nanaki, proving that you really are noble and courageous beyond words. Alucard tipped a wink at the wolf and opened the door for the elevator that would take them to the fuselage.

"Let us leave before anyone else falls."

Roland limped into the elevator, followed by everyone else.

* * *

Tristan introduced himself that night as the Highwind made its way over the last section of Zanarkand. It seemed as though the Heartless and the Nobodys began to fight each other, and so the numbers of both had dwindled significantly.

"The name's Tristan Riddell. That Auron guy talked a lot about you," he nodded at the gunslinger, "but the rest of you are strangers to me. Well, actually, that kid Tidus talked about your boy in green a lot. He was really excited to meet you, kid."

Tristan quickly resumed after seeing Link's face tilt down and frown, "But I'm sure you'll get your chance. Heartless aren't enough to take him down, especially if he's got Auron with him."

The gunslinger tilted back in his chair and closed his eyes. _This is your final story, gunslinger. _That was what Auron had told him in the desert, an event that seemed to happen more than a decade ago to Roland.

Cloud neglected to mention his current situation to the party. Ever since leaving Zanarkand, he began to feel his heart slowing down. At its current rate, it would be a while before it stopped completely, but that wasn't the entire problem. He felt like the back of his brain had strings attached to it, and that these strings were being pulled backward without end. To top it all off, he had been hearing a low drone of voices, similar to the insane babble one would hear as they walked through a mental asylum.

Sephiroth's control of Cloud was tightening fiercely and nobody knew. They didn't even suspect anything when he went to bed early, merely offering, "The battle wore me out," as an excuse. The hole in his chest had been healed rather quickly by the medi-station onboard, but the party didn't offer any sort of interrogation.

He dreamed of being in that ruined arena again. He kept feeling Sephiroth stab him over and over again, not just in one place, but in many. All the while the One Winged Angel taunted him about his life and his family. Cloud tried to wake up but found himself locked away in the nightmare.

Link dreamed again of the beach and the two boys. Again, they told him the importance of the key.

"_The key is the only way to unlock his heart," said dream-Tidus. _

"_The key to hearts can release the demon inside," said the other boy, whos name Link still did not know._

"_Where am I supposed to find this key anyway?" Link asked. He felt the tide rising higher, now around his waist._

"_In the highest room of the forgotten castle lies a door to all time and space. Open the door."_

_The water was up to Link's neck. "What's on the other side of the door?"_

_The two boys bade no reply, even as the sea took them under. Link tried to yell, "What is your name?" but it seemed as though Tidus' friend couldn't hear him._

As Link woke up he spoke a name, without even being conscious of this action. He wouldn't remember this name until he opened the door in the forgotten castle.

"Sora."


	25. A3 Chapter 10

_Ka-tet – Aboard the Highwind_

Cid and Tristan sat at opposite ends of the mess hall's sole dining table for breakfast that morning. Cloud was seriously weirded out about the situation – near-twins passive aggressively glaring across a table.

"Did you manage to break any parts of the engine this morning, Tristan?" Cid took a cigarette out from the pack tied in his goggles and lit it.

"I don't recall Cid. But hey, did you happen to fly into any mountains around dawn?" Tristan lit up a cigar and blew the smoke straight in front of him.

Link's eyes darted back and forth from the older men. Cloud was doing the same, his mind numb from the constant drone. Roland sat next to Link on one side, Cloud and Alucard on the other. Link was having a hard time with all of the tension in the room, so he decided to speak.

"So, I had another dream last night. About the boys."

The gunslinger set his utensils down and turned partially to the boy. "Were the two boys in it again?"

"Yupp, Tidus and his friend, uh. His friend…" Link snapped his fingers, attempting to bring the name from his memory. He tried for about fifteen seconds before Alucard interjected.

"The name is not currently important, if it was your dream memory would have the information for you. I know a little bit about dreams and slumber, and I can tell you that your dreams are more significant than those of the average person."

Link seemed pleased that he had something to really bring to the table. He had been so used to being "the one", a warrior with skills above many. But in this ka-tet, he was surrounded by fighters with identical status. His actions and contributions seemed less when stacked amongst others of his caliber.

Cloud tried to speak, but found the task much harder than it used to be. Each syllable made his head throb. "Maaybe…they're….st..still….alive."

He pretended that everyone did not choose that exact moment to stare at him concernedly. His attempt to hide his weakening mind was failing, and soon his mental capacity would lack enough power for even recognize that sort of fact, and there seemed to be no solution for him. Cid remembered seeing Cloud in a similar state before.

_He's slipping away again, just like Auron said he would. We need to book it to the remains of Horror Bastillion or whatever it's name was. Like I'd know anything about that place, why don't you ask the me from a different world. The one where Auron said I built ships out of shit called "gummy blocks". Whatever, I owe Cloud this much. Even if I didn't, I promised Tifa I'd bring the stupid kid home safe._

I'm sure you won't be very surprised to hear that Tristan was having similar thoughts on the matter. _Just like Auron said, what the hell is this shit? Whatever, that chick with the huge tits said to bring him home safe. Sure honey, maybe you can rub me all the right ways with those things later if I run your little errand. Consider it done, babe._

Link was hearing all of this and it took him every ounce of energy to keep from exploding with laughter.

* * *

While our ka-tet travels over Zanarkand and onto the great emptiness, we'll turn our eye to another important group of people, very much relevant to our story.

Two blue eyes stared across roof tops and over a cliff. Their owner, a young man with crazy, out of control, spikey hair is looking upon his next great battle.

"Sora, what can you see from here?" A six foot tall talking anthropomorphic dog stood over Sora's shoulders and pointing forward. "I can see Heartless and the Nobodys! What are we gonna do?"

"I'm not sure Goofy, but we've gotta win. Cloud is running out of time. Link is our only hope and we need to be at the door in time for him to receive the anti-keyblade."

A small crowd of people stood behind Sora and each one approached him and spoke one after another. The first was a young man named Leon who said, "I will fight with you until I drop or we get the job done." The second man was none other than Cid Highwind, a different one from the Cid currently flying the _Highwind _over an abyss. Cid said, "I've got your back, kid."

Tifa Lockhart and Yuffie Kisaragi both hugged Sora. "Anything for Cloud, even if it isn't necessarily my Cloud. It's still hard to comprehend that there's copies of us in another dimension like Riku said, but I don't care."

Yuffie jumped up in the air. "We'll fight for them too!"

Sora held out his hand and the keyblade materialized into it. It was the Oblivion key. Something inside of him came to, even partially _forward._ _Today, I add all of my power to yours…my other._

Sora held out his other hand and a keyblade materialized into that one too. This was the Oathkeeper key. Riku smiled down from the other side of the roof where he was slouching. _Good on you Roxax, he needs you today._

Hollow Bastion stood on the horizon of the Radiant Gardens. The castle itself had received restoration by some dark forces as of late, and it looked very close to how it appeared during Sora's first adventure.

The letter from King Mickey. That was the single object that brought all of these people here to fight in this one exact moment. Sora and his friends Riku and Kairi had received it on Destiny Islands but a few weeks after saying goodbye to Goofy and Donald.

_My friends,_

_The worlds are not as safe as we thought they would be. I've just received news that a dimension-hopping wizard has made pacts with Sephiroth. I believe you've met him before, haven't you? The Cloud that we know has completely disappeared and Sephiroth is hunting another version of him. You could say the version of him in another dimension and you'd hit the nail on the head. At any rate, that Cloud needs to stop Sephiroth. They say Sephiroth is aiding someone called the Crimson King, a man bent on destroying all that exists._

_He's taken control of the Heartless and he uses them to swallow up worlds, crumbling the forces that keep all of existence intact. I'll see you in Hollow Bastion, I have a couple of our friends on their way in gummi already._

_-The King_

Now they stood here overlooking the largest mass of Heartless ever seen. The town's security was starting to fail in containing them at the gates, and everyone knew the battle was really upon them.

Sora stood up on a crate and looked over his friends. "This isn't just about saving Radiant Gardens, this is about saving everything that ever was. If we don't get to the top of that castle, it could mean doom for us all. We can do this, we can beat back these Heartless! To the castle!"

The group screamed back, _"TO THE CASTLE!" _as they followed Sora's charge over the wall and into the horde.


	26. A3 Chapter 11

**AN: **I'm sorry. I am so very sorry.

* * *

_Ka-tet – Aboard the Highwind_

Link stared out the window of the Highwind as it soared through the clouds. They had long left Zanarkand behind and they were currently flying over what Cid called "missing chunks."

"I personally can't say much about them, I just know what Auron and Tidus told me. Apparently, this all has something to do with the Dark Tower opening temporal rifts in time-space. Parts of what of this world are disappearing and are being replaced by chunks from worlds that get devoured by the Heartless."

Roland had thought long and hard that night about the events that corresponded in Zanarkand, and he intended to bring some of his issues out in the open today. "So why help us? You know Cloud, and that means two things: you might be helping because he's a friend, but that still leaves the fact that you had to do…what did you call it Link?"

"World-hopping," Link filled in. He had felt uneasy ever since breakfast and the feeling that something big was happening refused to leave him. He just wanted to know _what _was happening. Even if it was bad, knowing at least removed the uncomfortable uncertainty.

"World-hopping, that's very apt. You had to do some world-hopping to get here, and in my own experiences, such a thing is no easy task."

Cid glared over his shoulder from the pilot's chair. "No, it's not. Damn near crushed my ship in the wormhole that took me here."

Tristan's grumpy voice came in over the intercom. "And let's not forget how we had to literally ride the Lifestream itself just to get to that wormhole."

Cloud was sitting in one of the corners of the flight deck, barely managing not to drool on himself. _He rode the Lifestream? Crazy bastard never lets up, I swear._

"But that still leaves my biggest question to be answered. Why help us?"

Cid rotated back around in his chair and stared ahead at the skies in front of him. "I, no, _we _promised Tifa that we'd bring back Cloud safe and sound. We're also running out of time. I don't know how much longer it will take Richard, no wait, _Dick _Sayre to find the rose. He's got all of the new ShinRa corporation behind him now that Rufus has gone missing. The only thing we've got going for us is that he doesn't have the Turks."

_So Reno decided to stay on our side this time. Good, I get tired of pummeling him sometimes, _thought Cloud.

Roland thought the whole situation felt vaguely familiar to him. I regret to tell you that there is no word strong enough to describe this feeling, for it far surpasses that of nostalgia and déjà vu. Before he could put any more thought into the matter, however, Alucard broke the silence.

"Where are we going? I feel…cramped."

Cid waved his hand around in the air, holding onto the controls with the other. "The remains of a place called Hollow Bastion. There's something at the top, a key of some sort that's supposed to help Cloud. The more you people bother me, the longer it's going to take for us to-"

Cid stopped talking because no one could hear him. Every warning light and buzzer in the ship went off simultaneously.

Tristan's voice boomed over the noise. _"HEARTLESS! NOBODYS! FUCKING EVERYTHING HOLY SHIT!"_

Link had seen the two clouds mere milliseconds before the ships sensors went off. To their front was a black wall of winged Heartless. Chasing behind them was a wall of Nobodys.

_Sandwiched, _thought Cid. "Alright everyone, battlestations."

Everyone in the flight deck scrambled for their weapons, except Cloud who sat against the wall like dead weight. Link looked into his eyes and saw them roll back. "Cloud isn't waking up! He's unconscious!"

Cid gently pushed him aside and backhanded Cloud across the face, producing no result. "Damn it Cloud, wake up!" Slap. "Wake!" Slap. "Up!" Slap.

A few explosions rocked the ship. Tristan came into the room with Nanaki, firing his Boom Lance before he shut the door. "They've boarded the ship and we've got quite a few hull breaches. The _Highwind _is going down."

Cid screamed and manned the controls again. "NO! I will NOT lost another _Highwind_ goddamnit! Hold on to yer briches, kids, this might hurt."

The ship was sandwiched between the walls of foes. The Heartless and the Nobodys tore each other, and the ship, apart as it spiraled downwards.

"_SHIT, WE'RE GOING DOWN. WE'RE GOING DOWN!"_

Link heard a million sounds screaming all at once. He hoped that something comforting would come to mind, but all that he heard was screaming. Smoke started to fill his nostrils as various control panels exploded and caught fire.

The gunslinger grabbed Link and buckled the two of them to the wall with a safety strap. Alucard grabbed onto Cloud and Nanaki, doing the same.

Tristan and Cid both lit up their own cancer-inducing tobacco products as the _Highwind _made her final decent.

"We did our best, right?" asked Tristan. He had to yell just to be heard above the sirens and explosions.

"Yeah, we sure as hell did. Hey, sorry for being hard on you. You're not such a bad guy really." Cid offered out a hand.

"Neither are you, _friend._" Tristan shook his hand as the ship impacted with the ground.

**...and that's the end of Arc Three. Why not leave a review**

**while you wait for me to start Arc Four, hmmm?  
**

**vvvvvvvvvvvvvvv**


	27. Intermission

Intermission and Acknowledgments

I want to start this all off by saying thank you to everyone who has kept up with Legends thus far. I'm really glad that people are enjoying the massive story I have to tell. I'd like to especially thank Joe and Josh Brown for coming up with most of the original concept, and then for being such good sports about me changing most of it XD

I have to also thank my biggest fan and my biggest inspiration dargit. He's been a loyal supporter since the beginning and before I even started Legends. Also, my only reviewer thus far. You go, man. And if you like Kingdom Hearts and/or Final Fantasy 8 fanfiction, you should check out his story called "Null Tongues". It is so fucking awesome.

* * *

Thank you's aside, I'd like to discuss my plans on the future of Legends. So far we've completed three out of seven planned arcs, so that leaves four to go. Coincidentally, the next arc is Arc Four: Intermedium. The original idea I had planned for Arc Four has been scrapped in favor of a much more...grandiose direction. I had an epiphany about what I want to do, so I decided to roll with it. Expect some cyber shenanigans :)

Until the journey ends,

-Dylan Kennedy


	28. Arc Four Chapter 1

**Author's Note: **We have come to the beginning of Arc Four - Intermedium. I can't really explain why I've decided to go in the direction that I'm choosing, I can only tell you that it feels right to me. For those of you who are sure to ask me: Yes, it's _that _Medium, and no, you won't be seeing the kids or the trolls. I look forward to continuing this story, dearest reader. My apologies for the short beginning -Dylan Kennedy

* * *

_Cloud – The Medium_

Cloud opened his eyes and saw whiteness all around him. He wasn't surrounded by white walls, mind you, just whiteness. Emptiness, but not necessarily nothingness.

"Where am I?" his voiced echoed. He sat up, and as he did so, the world around him became _something._

The sky filled with a thick cover of dark clouds, the land became a phosphorescent light show of glowing hills, and rivers of black oil ran freely. Cloud felt a nice breeze grace the skin on his body and it gave him some comfort. He felt okay, a little shaken up, but he couldn't remember why. He also felt something dangerous lurking far in the distance, but far enough for it to not be a concern at the present moment.

"Hey, wake up."

Cloud got to his feet and looked all around him. He couldn't find the source of the voice that had just spoken to him.

"You really ought to get moving, the Medium can be a dangerous place for newcomers."

Cloud drew his sword and looked down a trail of illuminated dirt. He figured that the voice was in his head, and as long as it wasn't Sephiroth, he didn't care. He began to walk down the road, and as he walked, he tried to remember how he came to be in this place.

He remembered breaking into ShinRa headquarters and stealing files about the monsters, but after that, everything became a massive blur.

* * *

Tidus gave a thumbs up to the man standing behind him. "I've got him, his consciousness has been uploaded into the server. What should I do now?"

The older blonde man behind him waved a hand in the air. "We wait and hope that he doesn't die within the Medium. It will keep him alive while we wait for the key to be used, but it's filled with perils. His subconscious feeds the Medium and it gives him creatures to fight in exchange."

He stroked his goatee and pulled a couple of books down from the shelf behind him.

"And if Sephiroth really does lurk within his heart, we can assume that the Medium will feed Cloud a projection of him too. I hope Cloud is ready to face his fears."

Ansem the Wise opened his book and began to write a new report.


	29. A4 Chapter 2

**AN: **As many of you Dark Tower fans are aware, the fourth installment of the DT series is basically a flashback sequence. As this is a fanfiction, I'm definitely taking a different direction for that portion of this arc. While I'd love to spend countless chapters on Roland's backstory, that would pretty much be blatant copy-paste of the DT series. I summarized the young gunslinger's exploits, but you can find the whole story in Dark Tower IV: Wizard and Glass. I also summarized a small portion of Link and Alucard's backstories so everything wouldn't seem extremely one-sided. Hope you guys are enjoying the story so far. -Dylan Kennedy

* * *

_Ka-tet – Crash site_

The gunslinger opened his eye and looked around. He was tangled in a cargo net with the by tucked next to him, still breathing. He found that he was a few feet off the ground and slightly sideways.

"Link, do you hear my voice?"

The boy nodded his head a little and tried to look up. His hat was tangled in the net and it made it hard for him to move his head around without ripping out hair or tearing the hat itself.

The gunslinger wiggled his arm behind himself and pulled his knife from his purse. "Brace yourself," he whispered. Roland cut the net and they fell onto the ground with a crash. They picked themselves up, sucking in air sharply as the pain of impact stung their knees.

They shoved a broken panel aside and found themselves outside of the crashed _Highwind _and onto the blacktop of a long-forgotten road. While Roland checked the Horn of Eld for cracks and damages, Link looked down the road in both directions. The gunslinger caught movement in his peripherals and turned to see Nanaki dragging a now-comatose Cloud from the wreck. Alucard had the pilot and the first-mate in each hand, pulling them alongside the wolf. They set the bodies against the nearest section of ship and looked to the gunslinger for guidance.

He motioned at Cid and Tristan. "Have they passed on?"

Alucard brushed his bangs out of his eyes. "No. They're alive, but definitely unconscious."

As if on cue, both of the men pulled their own choice of tobacco products and lit up a smoke. "Well that's the second goddamn time, I'm sick of losing these."

Tristan puffed on his cigar and blew smoke rings in front of him. "She's not lost completely. The hull is damaged pretty badly, but the ship is in one piece."

The gunslinger looked above him and was dismayed to find that the beam was not there. "We've gone off the path of the beam. We need to find it again."

_Go north to the ruined castle. Go find the key, Link._

The boy shook his head violently, clearing away the voice. It was that boy from the beach again, but this time he sounded a little distressed. _Maybe I need to hurry, _thought Link.

"Well what are you two going to do?" Alucard asked the blonde men.

They both looked at each other, stood up, and dusted themselves off. "Well, we're gonna fix the damn ship, that's what. Gonna be a lot harder to get home without it," replied Cid.

"We'll catch up with you guys eventually, I'm sure. Go and do what you gotta do, we'll take care of business here." Tristan offered a hand and shook with everyone in the ka-tet, sans Cloud. After Cid had done the same, Roland and his 'tet walked north down the road, Cloud draped over the wolf's back.

* * *

They walked by day and camped by night. They told stories to pass the time and often watched Cloud for any signs of life. Every now and then his body would twitch a little and everyone's hearts would race for a second. They would be disappointed every time when Cloud continued to remain unconscious.

Of the course of time that they spent on that old cracked road, the ka-tet shared stories with each other of their previous adventures. Roland recounted the story of his trip to Mejis, a trip that ultimately came to define the very man he was to be. He told them of his first love, Susan Delgado, and the short time they spent together. The gunslinger told them of the conspiracy he and his friends unraveled and how it led to Susan's murder at the hands of her own people.

Alucard chose to recount only the recent years, revealing that he was indeed a shape-shifting dhampir. He didn't reveal his father's true identity, lying instead by saying that he never personally met his own father. He explained that he was hunting a very powerful vampire when he came into the world and that when all was said and done, he intended to finish that quest.

Link told them about his adventures in Hyrule and Termina. He explained how he used the Master Sword and the Ocarina of Time to hope back and forth through time in order to save Hyrule from Ganondorf's evil. The boy also spoke of his adventure in Termina and how he once again manipulated time in order to save the world. Roland didn't know why, but for some reason he felt that he could relate to being under the influence of time in the same manipulative way that the boy had.

* * *

While the ka-tet shared these stories with each other, Cloud continued to explore the Medium.

Following the directions of what Cloud called the "Sky Voice," he ventured further into the strange land of the Medium. He found that he wasn't at all safe in that place, continually encountering strange imps as he made his way across the land. The imps were black with sharp teeth, about as tall as a child, and they were covered in zippers, belts, and chains. Upon seeing the first of these for himself, Tidus would ask Ansem why the imps looked that way.

"The Medium is based on a computer game that I discovered in my other worldly travels. Even I am not entirely sure what the original game is for, but I copied the data from the discs I found and used it to make the ultimate simulation software. I can create worlds, even universes, at my own whim inside the computer. To answer your question, the game requires one to prototype something called a kernel sprite at the beginning of each session. I managed in forcing the game to use a previously-made set of levels, but the simulation refused to load without prototyping. I prototyped a pair of red shorts that I found lying around in this mansion. I assumed that a pair of boy's shorts with ample zippers and chains wouldn't create too much trouble for Cloud."

Cloud found that he didn't hate the Medium, but his feelings of homesickness grew exponentially. He wanted nothing more than to see the mother of his child and his home, even if it meant dealing with ShinRa goons.

For now, he would have to be content with killing imps and searching for the answers to his lost memories within the lands of the Medium.


	30. A4 Chapter 3

_Cloud – The Medium_

Cloud was resting near a river of oil, exhausted after a particularly intense struggle. The whole time he had been in the Medium he had been fighting the zipper imps, but something happened and they _changed_ on him. The zipper imps had been hardly a struggle for Cloud, he cut them down with ease, but something had altered them during the last battle.

Cloud had just carved up the last one of the small fry and was beginning to turn his attention to one of the large imps. Despite their size (about three of Cloud put together) they were generally easy, but when Cloud went to attack it, things started to go wrong. The imp fell to one knee and a strange light began to emanate from within it. Lines of letters and numbers began rapidly swirling around the imp until it was covered in a shell of semi-opate green hexagons. Cloud hacked away at it, but all of his efforts seemed to do no damage.

Meanwhile, Tidus and Ansem were typing up a storm at the control station. Ansem punched the wall next to him in frustration. "It's a virus, I know it! The virus has rewritten the monster's data and gave it infinite hit points."

Tidus shouted over his shoulder, "Can't you merge the systems? You know the two security programs could take care of this."

"Of course I can merge them, I have remote access. But even so, it's too soon, Tidus. If we merge the Medium with Hollow Bastion OS now, all of the hostile programs in the network would gain another entryway to Cloud. Additionally, the virus would leak out into our server."

"Well Cloud's not looking so good right now."

Cloud began to find himself getting angrier and angrier as he failed to damage the corrupted imp. He took a severely savage punch to the face that sent him flying backward into some glowing mushrooms. His sword clattered to the ground several feet away from him.

Tidus rushed across the room and shoved Ansem's hands away from the keyboard. "He's gonna die, I'm merging the systems!" Before Ansem could say a single word, Tidus typed the command and the Medium froze. A blue portal opened in the sky and two figures dropped down from it.

Each one landed on either side of Cloud. Both wore some rubber-like matte-black armor with blue strips of LEDs on it. They appeared to be men with a slightly grey complexion. They both pulled out black discs from a slot on their backs and held them in their hands, each wielding dual-discs.

The one with a "T" on his chest spoke, "Corruption identified. Security program Tron initializing."

The other, bearing an "N" on his chest spoke in a different voice, "Security program Norton initializing. Prepare for combat."

Cloud picked himself up and the world unfroze. He tried to attack the monster but found that he could only move around in place. Tron and Norton seemed to also stay relatively in-place, breathing and moving slightly in their battle-stances.

"Why can't I move?" Cloud kept trying to rush forward but found himself glue to a 1ft square of movement, only allowing him to hop up and down or bob in a battle stance.

"Combat intiated: System overload causing a downgrade to turn-based combat," said the one who identified as Norton.

Tron held his discs out and charged at the corrupted imp. He leapt into the air and slashed downward, knocking the imp back a little. Tron ran back to his original position and resumed his idle battle stance.

Cloud tried again to move and discovered that he could not. Instead, the imp hurled a particularly large rock at Norton, who was hit in the thigh. He winced but stood his ground. Norton threw his discs at the imp with a loud grunt. They crossed paths in mid-flight, buzzed across the imp's torso, and flew back to Norton's hands.

Cloud heard the Voice from the Sky again, "Now it's your turn Cloud, either punch him or grab your sword!"

Cloud ran forward, picked his sword up out of the dirt, and found himself (unwillingly) running back to his square. He began to really hate this whole "turn-based" thing, vowing to find a way to fix it if he could.

"At least I have my sword…" he grumbled as he gently swayed back and forth. The imp leaped up into the air and slammed down onto the ground, sending out a shockwave that sent the party reeling backwards.

Tron put his arms through the center of his discs, wearing them as bracelets. "Enough of your corruption, monster. Data drain!"

He held his arms out as giant streams of data flowed out of them. They engulfed the corrupted imp and encased it in a swiring white mass of random letters and numbers. After a couple seconds, the mass shattered like glass and the streams faded.

The imp was still there, but it was no longer covered in the layer of green hexagons.

Cloud stared at Tron. "How-"

Norton flashed a small smile. "Data drain. It rewrites the monster's data, allowing use to remove the viral infection that gave it infinite hit points. Watch." Norton threw himself on the imp, cutting it across the neck with one disc and stabbing it in the forehead with the other. The imp disintegrated into a puff of black smoke and it was done.

Cloud moved around, truly appreciating the freedom of unrestricted movement.

* * *

Back in the control room, Ansem consulted the computer's resource manager. "It appears that merging the systems put a heavier strain on the server than I initially thought. It has disabled free combat in addition to removing all of the security blocks I had placed to keep Cloud from moving around into other worlds."

Tidus scratched his head. "Wasn't Cloud going to have to go through the Land of Hearts and Twilight to get onto the Grid anyway?"

"While that is indeed true Tidus, I would have preferred him to make that transition only during the critical moment. He isn't ready for the Grid yet, because if these scans are telling the truth, the Grid is far more corrupted than we initially thought. And there's something else."

Tidus raised an eyebrow. "What?"

Ansem pointed at a screen showing a seemingly ordinary town on it. In the center of the screen was a teenage boy looking at the town around him. He brushed a hand through his spikey, dirty-blonde hair while the other fingered his necklace.

"_He's _back."


	31. A4 Chapter 4

**AN: **Sorry for the absurd amount of breaks. I'm juggling a lot of characters here, people. XD

* * *

_Ka-tet – Ruined Road_

The gunslinger rolled a smoke as his ka-tet rested from a good five hours of walking. The beam was still nowhere in sight and Cloud had yet to come back to consciousness.

Link looked far down the road and found more of the same: rusted-out transportation contraptions left by Roland's Old Ones. Roland called them "cartomobiles."

"Sure is a long walk…" Link sighed. Alucard looked up from meditation and added, "The most important walks usually are."

* * *

Cloud looked at the white house in front of him with disbelief. "Why is this house the size of a skyscraper?" He wasn't exaggerating, the suburban house that stood before him was indeed as tall as any of Midgar's most gratuitous buildings. The second story had been copied several hundred times, producing a "tower" that led up to several blue portals in the sky.

"A leftover from the original session," said Tron. "This belonged to the primary player."

Cloud shrugged, holding his palms up. "Whatever. Where do the portals go?"

"To the other worlds from this session. The Land of Light and Rain is our next destination, followed by the Land of Heat and Clockwork," answered Tron.

"We'll be skipping through the Land of Snow and Frogs, as it is not relevant to our objective." Norton was studying a holograph coming out of his right arm.

"What do you mean 'objective'? I still don't have an answer to why I'm _here _and not dead by ten tons of ShinRa gunfire. Or…" his face went pale. "Am I dead? Is this really what the end looks like?"

* * *

Tidus read the message on his computer screen out loud. "Security Program Tron is asking for permission to answer truthfully. Should I accept it?"

Ansem closed his book. "No. Cloud's mind isn't ready for that kind of shock yet, we could lose him."

Tidus shook his head. "There really isn't a single conceivable lie to be told. Cloud won't believe anything we tell him anyway, so we might as well just tell the truth."

Tidus typed the "Y" key and Tron started talking.

"This is a simulated world made to hold a person's consciousness in order to keep them from dying. In order for someone to die, their mind must also die. This, of course, can't happen here in the Medium."

"The hell it can't!" Cloud yelled. "I got pummeled by that imp and it hurt. You know, _real pain _kind of hurt."

Norton frowned. "I'm afraid you can die in here Cloud. However, this is actually a game aftet all. The main User of this system stole the software from a game called Sburb, which is used for creating universes. Ansem modified the code and made it into a simulation."

Cloud rolled his eyes. "Yeah, so where do you and Tron come from then? You don't look like the chumps around here."

The two programs looked at each other, nodded, and looked back at Cloud. "We're from The Grid, which is where we're supposed to bring you," they replied in unison.

"And if I don't want to go, what happens to me? You'll data drain me like you did that imp?"

"No. But if you want to leave the Medium, you'll have to go through the I/O Tower, which is on The Grid."

Cloud stabbed his sword into the ground and leaned on the handle. He closed his eyes and began to think. _I can either follow these two and maybe get myself killed, or I can wander around aimlessly and maybe get myself killed. This game is stupid and I don't like it._

"I'll go, just get me out of this thing."

* * *

"Hey Roxas!"

Roxas turned around to see a pair of angry brown eyes staring back at him. "Where have you been? We were all supposed to go to the festival, but none of us could find you anywhere." Hayner pointed at him and looked off to the side.

"It's like you disappeared, man."

Roxas took a step back and held up his hands. "I'm sorry Hayner, I…" he struggled to find the right words. "I had to go, for a little bit. But I'm back, so we're cool, right?"

Hayner held out a fist. "You know it." Two best friends, reunited, bumped fists. Roxas smiled and followed Hayner to the Usual Spot, where Pence and Olette were hanging out.

On the way there, Roxas held internal council. _As much as I miss them, they aren't real. None of this is real. I don't even know why I'm here if I'm supposed to be with Sora._

"Roxas!" Pence and Olette yelled as Hayner brought him in. Roxas waved his hand at them, "Hey guys. Sorry about missing the festival."

Olette got in his face and pointed at him angrily. "_And_ the first day of school!"

Pence peered over her shoulder. "We still gave you credit on the report though, so you should be okay on that." He smiled large, the smile Roxas had come to miss so much. Few people possess this gift, but Pence had the smile that could melt a murderer's rage and bring peace to even the most troubled mind. The smile that said "All is good in the world." Roxas valued Pence's friendship because of it.

But it was still fake, just like everything else there, and Roxas knew that too.


	32. A4 Chapter 5

**AN: **Greetings, Dearest Reader. I know I've been a bit of a bastard, keeping you waiting on updates and such. I apologize, school has started and I've found that a lack of free time and sleep is the fastest way to silence your muse. She did, however, speak to me tonight to let me know how everyone is doing. I know it was brief, but I hope you'll find it short and sweet. I'm sure she'll take some time to really talk to me sometime in the near future. Thank you for your dedication. -Dylan Kennedy

* * *

_Cloud and the Programs – The Medium_

Cloud felt his feet lock in place once again. Three imps stood opposite him and his new allies. The air filled with the humming of identity disks. "Ambushed," said Norton.

The imp in front of Tron stuck its zipper-tongue out at them. It lunged forward, swiping three times at Tron. The security program dipped and dodged, evading the attack. Cloud found himself holding up his sword, blocking the spit ball that had been shot at him. The final imp merely shook its head back and forth and spat on the ground.

Norton attacked first, dragging his discs across the metal platform as he charged his opponent. Sparks trailed behind them, then with the discs as they slashed the imp's face in half. Tron flung his discs in a crossing-arc, taking his enemy's head clean off. Cloud stared at the imp. The heat waves coming from the lava below them made the image hazy.

Not hazy enough for him to miss. One swing of the Buster Sword was all it took. After the kill, he rested his sword across his shoulder. "Why did we have to go somewhere so _hot_?" he asked.

"Faster than traveling through the sea in the Land of Light and Rain. We're almost at our destination," said Norton. Out of the two programs, he was far more analytical, often giving the facts of the situation with little enthusiasm.

Cloud looked around and appreciated the landscape. A series of metal platforms made up the (hardly) inhabitable space within the Land of Heat and Clockwork. Giant cogs and gears often protruded from these platforms, some of them even rotated the platforms themselves.

As Cloud traveled through LOHAC, he began to regain some of his memory. He remembered leaving Midgar and meeting…_someone. _Maybe multiple people. It was fuzzy, like trying to remember a dream after waking up.

* * *

"Something is happening to Cloud, Ansem. His memories are coming back!" said Tidus as he mashed the keyboard. He was so happy that his typing speed had increased two fold.

"It would appear that the presence of the Keyblade is affecting his memories. Roxas might be useful after all, although how he got into the simulation in the first place still eludes me. He must have entered at the exact same time as Cloud, which could mean a few things…"

Ansem shuffled through a pile of papers on his desk. He found one of them and slammed his fist down upon it. "It was the damn fetch modus, I knew it was too risky!"

Tidus swiveled around in his chair. "I still don't understand what's going on. Could ya explain it to me?"

Ansem covered his eyes with his right hand, the universal symbol of anguish. "The fetch modus was set to draw in and upload a dormant consciousness. Roxas's consciousness has laid mostly dormant since joining with Sora, so the modus grabbed him as well." Ansem began to brood. His wise eyes stared holes in the wall.

"I don't see why you're so hard on the guy. Everyone has a right to be happy," mumbled Tidus.

"Roxas is a Nobody, and Nobodies have no rights."

* * *

The ka-tet continued to walk down the old road. Their day-to-day life consisted of killing the small animals that came their way, here and there, but the rest was walking.

Two hobbits once shared a very similar fate.

Link stretched his arms out and yawned. "I'm getting kind of tired, Roland. Can we stop soon?" he asked.

Roland looked towards the sun, measuring the time with his eyes. "We've still got three hours of daylight, no sense in stopping now. You'll live to walk another day."

And so they walked steadily onward with nothing in sight other than the road and the horizon.


	33. A4 Chapter 6

_Roxas – Twilight Town_

"Can't get enough, can you?" Seifer taunted as he stood over the crumped body of a young man, his struggle bat pointed at his victim's head. The kid on the ground had been beaten up pretty bad, enough to where he had difficulty moving.

"You like this you sick little faggot." The kid on the ground spat out a tooth followed by a spray of blood. Roxas entered the sandlot just in time to see Seifer raise his bat for the finishing blow.

"Stop it Seifer! What did you do to him?" Roxas couldn't recognize the guy on the ground, but that didn't matter. The knowledge that this world wasn't _real _didn't matter either. He hadn't taken shit from Seifer last time he was here, why should he make one now?

Seifer snarled. "Same thing I'll do to you, Roxas, if you don't mind your own damn business." He held his bat out at the would-be protector.

Roxas picked up a bat off the ground and brandished it. Seifer smiled and snapped his fingers, summoning his two cronies, Raijin and Fuujin, at his side.

Roxas slumped his shoulders. "Okay, this is fair."

Raijin crossed his arms and leaned back. "We've always got Seifer's back, ya know!"

"Loyalty," said Fuu, not one for many words.

Roxas, sure that he would have to fight three-on-one, suddenly felt a hand on each of his shoulders. To his right was his old friend, Hayner. To his left was some kid on a bicycle he had never seen before.

"Oh look, it's Chicken-wuss and the nobody. Getting off the bike to play with the big boys, Tristan?" Seifer kicked his victim again. The kid on the ground groaned in pain.

"Bikes are for sissies, ya know!" said Rai.

Tristan placed one foot on the pedal. He held out his own struggle bat, the kind with a defensive hand guard, and yelled out at Rai. "Rai, you have got to be the biggest tool in Twilight Town. Maybe you'll talk less if I knock out your teeth, YA KNOW!"

Tristan bum-rushed Rai, pedaling as fast as he could. The reach of Rai's punched was outmatched by Tristan's and Rai found himself blocking a mighty swing with his face.

With Rai floored, Roxas and Hayner took advantage of the surprise attack and charged in. Roxas faced Seifer as Hayner engaged Fuu.

"What is it about your face that just ticks me off?" said Seifer as he prepared a swing.

"I told you-" said Roxas, dodging the swipe "-it's destiny." Roxas swung his bat upward, catching Seifer under the chin. Seifer wobbled on his feet and fell to the ground.

Hayner and Fuu circled each other. "Look, I don't want to hit a girl," said Hayner.

"Coward." Fuu replied, punching him square in the face. Hayner stumbled backwards and put a hand to his bleeding nose. After looking at the blood on his hand, he hurled his struggle bat high over Fuu's head. She smirked, thinking he had missed.

Hayner was happy to see that smirk. He ran at her and leapt into the air, catching the struggle bat in the air and throwing it downward, striking Fuu on the top of her head.

"Doesn't count if I'm not holding it!" Hayner laughed and high fived Roxas. They turned their attention to the kid on the ground and helped him up.

Hayner's eyes grew large in their sockets. "_Simon_? Why did you let him beat you up like that?"

Simon spat out more blood and perhaps a bit of mucus. "…got the jump on me," he lied. Tristan came to a stop next to them.

"Can you walk, Simon?"

Simon looked up the tall hill leading back to his house. "Sure, probably." The other three boys frowned at him. "You're full of shit Simon Gunner," said Tristan. "Get on the pegs, I'll take you home."

* * *

_Link stands alone on a beach. He is surrounded by tropical trees, sea, sand, and for some reason, wooden shacks._

This is where he lived once_, Link thinks. He knew the name of the boy with spikey brown hair once, but he has forgotten._

_A voice behind him calls out, "Starts with an 'S'!"_

_Link turns around finding himself face-to-face with the boy. The boy, who Link can only think of as S, holds out a sinister looking red and black key. "Hurry to the castle, Link. You're almost there, I promise. I'm on my way."_

_The dream begins to collapse and the sand begins to fall away. Link yells, "Tell me your name! I need to remember your name!"_

_S smiles and gives Link a thumbs-up as he falls through the world._

* * *

"Starts with an 'S'," Link mumbled as he opened his eyes. The sun was barely rising, this time in the South instead of the East. The gunslinger was already awake and having a smoke. He held out a gunslinger burrito to Link.

"Hungry?" said Roland as he took a long drag on his cigarette.

Link sat up and took the burrito, but he did not eat it.

Alucard rose to his feet in one swift motion, the same way he rose from slumber every morning. He petted Nanaki's head before sitting down next to Roland and Link. "So what starts with an 'S' that is significant?" asked Alucard.

"The one with the key, his name starts with an 'S'."

"The one from your dreams?" Roland flicked the roach of his cigarette out into the road.

Link nodded. "He says we're getting close but I keep feeling like we're never moving fast enough."

The gunslinger and the dhampir got to their feet and dusted themselves off. Roland looked at the sun, frowned, and turned back to the boy. "Then let us make haste."

The ka-tet packed up and left without another word.


	34. A4 Chapter 7

**AN: **Sorry for the long wait, I've just been a little out of touch with my muse. I know this chapter jumps around a lot between all of the characters, but I'm sure you'll find the pace thrilling, to say the least. Things are falling into place, you see dearest reader? I won't let you down.

* * *

_Sora – Hollow Bastion_

"He's almost there. It's time." Sora looked out into the chasm and regarded the massive, writhing army of Heartless. He had fought such an army before, but this time, he was running against the clock. Not to mention that this army was at least twice the size of the aforementioned one.

Once again his allies stood by his side, preparing for an event that could be the last battle of their lives. Leon flicked the cylinder of his gunblade out, loaded in six bullets, and snapped the cylinder back in. Cid sharpened the tip of his spear and smoked a cigarette (the Cid in Roland's world was doing the same thing, coincidentally). Riku stood up from his leaning spot against the wall and approached Sora.

He laid a hand on his friend's shoulder. "Going into the mess again, aren't we?"

Sora turned and smiled. "Yeah, but we're not alone. The strength of all our hearts makes us stronger than any amount of Heartless they can throw at us." Sora's smile faltered and he grabbed his chest, breathing heavily. He went limp and leaned against the ledge.

Riku took a step forward and held out his hand. "You feeling okay? Here, let me help you up." Sora grabbed Riku's hand and stood up, looking past him and out into space.

"Something's going on with Roxas. I feel a little tired. Something tells me that he's fighting too."

Riku waved a hand. "He's strong, he'll be fine. I should know." Riku punched his friend in the arm.

Sora laughed and turned around, facing the hill that led down to the army of Heartless. He held out his arm and his Keyblade materialized in his hand. Sora turned his head and gave everyone a smile and a thumbs-up. His friends looked back at him, weapons in hand and minds ready for battle.

Sora turned and ran down the hill without a sound. Riku followed behind bellowing, "_FOR ROXAS!_"

Leon charged behind him screaming, "_FOR HOLLOW BASTION!_"

Tifa, the last to follow, looked up at the sky and held out her hand. "Wherever you are, even if you aren't my Cloud, I'm fighting for you."

* * *

"_Why._"

Cloud frowned at the scene before his eyes. A small army of imps blocked the portal to Twilight Town. His party would have to fight all the way to it. He faced the Programs.

"You guys ready?"

Tron and Norton nodded, drawing their discs. "Combat mode initiated, pre-emptive strike!" said Tron.

Cloud hurled his sword forward and sprinted after it. He jumped forward, caught it just before the front line, and swung it around in a large arc. The inertia of the blow sent imps flying in all directions.

Norton held up his discs into the air. "Dual-technique: Criss-Cross activated!" He and Tron threw their discs in two crossing arcs, creating a quad-arc in the middle. Imps were buzzed and slaughtered en masse.

With each row of enemies downed, the party moved forward. Both Sora's and Cloud's groups gained inch after inch by slaughtering the next line and then the next. The two parties were gaining ground against massive armies, one Heartless and the other zipper-imp.

Cloud cut through another imp vertically and saw the portal through the spray of goo that followed. He motioned and Tron ran through the waves, holding his disc up high in the portal's beam of light.

Back in the computer room, Tidus typed away furiously at a keyboard. "Ansem, they're initiating the transfer!" The old man grinned and typed in a single command on his computer. "So our man came through. The rest is up to Sora." He hit the "enter" key and closed his eyes.

* * *

The ka-tet appreciated the ruined castle in all of its desolate glory. It was a massive conglomerate of cobblestone and brass pipes, a testament to steampunk fortresses everywhere.

Link approached the gate surrounding the castle. The entrance was shut and wouldn't budge. He placed his hands on the bars. "Sora's almost there. We've got to hurry."

A flat slab of stone stood off to the side of the gates. Some sort of engraving on it caught Alucard's eyes. His eyes flicked all around as he examined the stone.

"Roland, can I see your waterskin? I think there's something worth seeing on that stone there."

The gunslinger gave one of his signature thin smiles and tossed the waterskin over. "Try not to use too much, we're running low. And Link, could you come over here for a minute?"

Link nodded and the gunslinger took him aside. "I've told you that you have a very special power, right? It's called the Touch."

Link fixed his conical hat. "Yeah, I remember you saying something about it before. It's the power to read minds, right?"

"Yes, but the touch does much more than that. When people are bound by destiny, such as this ka-tet, the touch allows you to see their minds and emotions. All of us in the ka-tet can do it, but I think you're especially gifted. Even more so than my childhood friend Alain."

Link poked his fingers together. "So why are you telling me this?"

"I need you to try to touch Cloud. See if you can sense him or perhaps even send a message. Whatever or wherever his mind is, we need it to be ready for whatever your friend Sora has in mind for us. Can you try?"

Link looked over at Cloud, then back at Roland. "I'm not entirely comfortable with the idea of snooping around in people's minds, but I'll do this. Just…please don't ask me to do it when he comes back, okay?"

Roland squeezed the boy's shoulder. "Of course not. You're a good kid, Link."

The boy's eyes filled with gratitude. He ran over to Cloud and sat down in the road next to him and Nanaki. The wolf licked his paws, eyeing the boy the entire time.

_I know he's my ancestor, but it's weird seeing him so young. The legends really are true about him, he is the most courageous person I've ever seen. He's such a nice person too, it's too bad I can't tell him any of this, _thought the wolf.

Link shook his head and looked over at Nanaki. "Did he just? No…must be imagining things," he mumbled to himself.

The gunslinger took a look at the stone. Alcuard pointed out the engravings on it. "A staff with musical notes, but for what? And look at the top."

Roland's eyes moved upward. He saw what Alucard was referring to: a picture of an ocarina and a wolf. Except it wasn't just any ocarina, it was _Link's _ocarina, the one and only Ocarina of Time.

"Looks like someone was expecting us."

* * *

Sora knocked another Heartless away with his Keyblade. He could see the big wooden doors to the castle, having made it past the gate, but he was being quickly surrounded by Heartless.

"Okay, this is fair." He crouched and prepared for the Heartless to pounce, but instead, he felt a figure drop down behind him. He could see the bottom of a red cloak.

"Looks like you need a guardian after al." Auron took a swig from his jug and held out his sword at one _very _unfortunate Heartless.

"Your pain shall be two-fold." He and Sora charged in opposite directions, slashing away at their foes. Auron grimaced as his katana was caught in a armored Heartless' guard. He shifted his weight and shoved with his free shoulder, knocking the guard away. The backswing of his parry decapitated the Heartless, sending its helmeted head flying.

"Sora, go! Your part of this story is now, deliver that key!"

Sora whirled his Keyblade around, knocking Heartless away. "I'm not going to leave you behind, Auron!"

"Don't argue, just go!"

Sora threw his Keyblade over Auron, intercepting an aerial enemy. "If you're really my guardian, you'll go with me!" Sora made a break for the door. The circle of Heartless attempted to close the gap.

"Heh. Just like some other stupid kid I know. Fine then, Sora. As you wish." Auron ran forward and cut through the closing gap, catching up with Sora. The others were at the drawbridge's wheel cranks.

"Come on!" yelled Leon. Cid gritted his teeth as he held the other crank, nearly biting his cigarette in half from the tension.

Sora and Auron leapt over the small gap between the drawbridge and the doors. After they cleared it, Cid and Leon let go of the wheels. They began to turn backwards, powered by the castle's machinery. The bridge went up and the doors closed.

"This place is filled with them Heartless," said Goofy. He held up his shield over his face and looked around. Donald stood next to him, staff in hand.

"Then we'll fight to the top!" Donald let loose one of his strange yelling quacks and ran down the hall.


	35. A4 Chapter 8

**AN: **For when you finish this chapter: Yes, the stories are connected. That's all I can say at this time. -Dylan Kennedy

* * *

_The Heroes – Hollow Bastion_

Three different parties made their way to the same critical moment. Sora and his friends stormed Hollow Bastion, carving a path through mobs of Heartless to reach the door. Roland's ka-tet climbed Hollow Bastion's twin, scrambling over ruins and collapsed hallways. Cloud's party entered Twilight Town and stumbled upon a struggling Roxas in the sandlot.

He was surrounded by several Nobodys and he looked completely exhausted. Cloud charged in to save the helpless kid and found himself able to fight without restricted movement.

"_I CAN MOVE?" _he screamed, smiling wide.

Tron hurled a disc by Roxas's face. "Yeah, this server is running at full capacity. ATB is disabled, feel free to use the space!"

Cloud dove into the gaggle, swinging the Buster Sword in large arcs. Roxas, doubled over and panting, looked up at Cloud as he slaughtered the Nobodys. _He's gotta be the one, _he thought.

"You…Cloud Strife?" he gasped. Cloud sliced another enemy out of the air and looked down at Roxas.

"Yeah, who's asking? Hit the ground!" They both dropped as Tron and Norton unleashed another dual-tech. The blondes felt hot air and heard the sound of buzzing discs fly inches above their heads.

Roxas nudged Cloud in the side. "I don't have time to explain, but you need to come with me to the mansion. I'm going to get you back to your friends."

Cloud dropped his sword and stared blankly. The memories finally returned in full-force and he found it hard to keep himself from weeping. The world became silent, all he could hear was the muffled voices of his friends. Roland's dry humor, Link's cheery boy encouragement, and Alucard's calm observations. He vaguely felt himself being pulled away from the fight by Roxas. He hardly noticed the Programs covering their withdrawal with the range of their discs.

By the time they entered the mansion's basement, his mouth was slightly agape and he found it impossible to speak. The memories hit him like a tank and it was just too much.

Roxas glanced over at the digital copy of Tidus' terminal – the same one he smashed to hell before finding Sora. It had been repaired, apparently. The portal back to reality was activated.

Tron and Norton each took a terminal and began entering commands. "You're good to go, guys. It's been great."

Norton waved a hand in the air. "Glad we could help out some great Users!"

Cloud waved a dazed goodbye and let himself be dragged into the portal by Roxas. Back in the real mansion, Tidus typed in a single command:

/link

He pushed the "enter" key and sat back in his chair. His work was done.

* * *

Roxas and Cloud entered a tunnel of light. They stood in the middle, surrounded by floating neon lines of code and darkness. The exit on Cloud's end was blue, the other was red. Roxas held out his hand for a handshake.

"I'm sorry all of this was so brief but I've done what I came here to do. My part in this story is over."

Cloud shook his hand. "Maybe not, Roxas. I have a feeling that you're hard to get rid off. I'm sure we'll meet again some day, you may not know it's me and I may not know it's you, but it'll happen."

Roxas's jaw dropped as Cloud turned and exited the tunnel through the blue portal.

* * *

At the top of the two towers, the doors opened. Sora could barely make out four humans and a wolf on the other side. "Catch!" he yelled as he hurled Riku's Keyblade through the door.

On the other side, Link caught the weapon with both hands. He wanted to reach out and try to touch him to see if he really was real, but the computers powering the inter-dimensional portal began to catch fire and explode. _I'm never going to learn his name! _he thought in a panic.

Sora took a step forward and yelled through the door. "It's Sora! Good luck Link!"

The door slammed shut and the circuits went dead. Sora turned and held out his arms. "Guess our part of this story is over, huh Auron?"

Auron turned to the side and pointed up towards the ceiling. "Far from it, it seems."

The One Winged Angel floated in the air above them. A sickly-looking young man was being held in the air by Sephiroth's telekinesis.

"That's right Simon, give in to the darkness. Let it consume your weak little heart."

Riku balled up his fists. "Don't listen to him! The darkness doesn't make you stronger, it just eats you alive!"

Sephiroth began to dematerialize, laughing. "You're quite the hypocrite aren't you?"

Simon Gunner reached out to the group below and spoke three words before dematerializing along with Sephiroth:

"I'm sorry Sydney."

**Finally pulled all of the plot strings together. For those of you that aren't aware,**

**Simon Gunner is from a story by dargit called Null Tongues. You can find dargit's page here: .net/u/1950742/**


	36. A4 Chapter 9

_Auron – Hollow Bastion_

The corner of the ronin's mouth curled up into a half-smile. His work was done here, the key was through the door and the Keybearer was safe. He had not failed his duties as a guardian.

He was far from finished with remaining as an Unsent, however. Auron heard the voices return, coaxing him to return to the farplane. His body began to disappear as he ran down the stairs and he gritted his teeth against the pain.

_NO! _he screamed inside his mind. _I'm not done yet! There won't be a farplane for me to return to unless I pave the road to the Tower!_

The voices settled and then they were gone. Auron doubled over, dropping his sword, and began to breathe deeply. His hands, which had started to become translucent only moments ago, were refilling with color. With every breath he began to feel more whole.

After he could see the world without streaks of fluorescent color banding across his vision, he picked up his sword and summoned a portal to the hallways of darkness. The ronin refused to even wince as he entered the place that would make regular men's hearts falter and surrender themselves totally and completely to darkness.

Then again, Auron wasn't a regular man. He wasn't even _alive_, technically speaking. He did, however, possess something of a heart. Unsent were somewhere between normal beings and Nobodys, possessing heart and shell but only partially in both cases.

He strode down the halls of darkness, the path between worlds, with his sword rested across his shoulders and his free arm in the haori. Screams of monsters that few should ever see, let alone hear, echoed in the darkness. If the gunslinger were there, he would have had a name for this darkness for the people in Mid-World were aware of these places. Some spoke of it in quiet places under their breath, some brayed lunatic chants to it at the moon while sacrificing small animals or children, and some pretended it simply did not exist at all.

Auron walked through the Todash darkness towards the sister castle where Roland's ka-tet was attempting to pull Cloud back to reality. He exited the halls in the twin room to the one he had entered in. A short climb up the stairs brought him before a broken door and a broken ka-tet. Nanaki sat in the corner, his tail making slow swipes across the floor. Roland leaned against the broken computer banks, their fires now extinguished, and Alucard approached the boy standing over Cloud. Link held Riku's keyblade in his hand, unable to bring himself to do the task necessary to revive Cloud.

Alucard placed one hand upon Link's shoulder and nodded to him. Auron did the same, setting down his sword and taking the other shoulder. Link looked up at the ronin and a single tear rolled down his face.

"You can do it, have courage," said Auron.

Auron and Alucard stepped away. Link closed his eyes and took a deep breath. The others in the room let out small gasps as a strong yellow light began to eminate from Link's hand.

The triforce markings he bore as an adult now appeared on the back of his left hand, the same one holding the keyblade. Three golden triangles shone brightly, illuminating the faces of those who bared witness to the power of courage. Link opened his eyes and brought the keyblade down onto Cloud's heart.

Link stepped back as Cloud's body began to thrash about. His mako eyes opened and the room filled with the echoes of his memory. The ka-tet and the ronin heard the screams of slain beasts, the clashing of swords between Cloud and the One Winged Angel that sought to bring Midgar to ruin. But the memory that echoed loudest was the voice of Tifa. _"Come back to me alive, and be ready to raise your child," _she had said.

The keyblade disintegrated and Cloud sat upright. His vision slurred and he shook his head to clear it. The room came into focus, his ka-tet standing around him in a circle. Cloud scratched the back of his head and closed his eyes.

"Kept you waiting, huh?"

Link, unable to control himself any longer, ran forward and hugged Cloud. "You were only gone for a month but it felt like years," he sobbed into Cloud's shoulder. Roland sat down on his haunches and offered Cloud a cigarette. "Need a smoke?"

Cloud gently pushed it away and returned to petting the back of Link's head. "No thanks, you know I don't smoke."

Alucard waved his hand in small circles, as if to say, "And there you have it, he has returned!" He looked to the hole in the ceiling and was not surprised to see the full moon rising above them. _You have a way of provoking strong emotions, don't you? Keep us safe tonight, let the struggle stay at bay for now._

Nanaki nudged his nose against Cloud's back and curled up against him. Cloud, feeling colder than he had in his entire life, appreciated the warmth as much as the affection.

Auron smiled. All was well. Another chapter of the story was complete. The ronin turned and left without saying a word. The ka-tet was only vaguely aware of his presence and took no notice when he left.

* * *

A now visibly-pregnant Tifa tended flowers in a certain church in Sector 5 of Midgar. Reno and Rude stood at the doors, keeping watch for new ShinRa troops.

"Don't you find it the least bit ironic that _we're _keeping watch for _ShinRa _troops? This all seems backwards to me, still," said Reno. He adjusted the goggles on his head and punched Rude in the arm. "You look so serious all the time, lighten up! We'll be heroes once we off the guy that offed Rufus and heroes can't look like they're having trouble using the bathroom."

Rude cracked his neck and stretched his arms out in front of him. "I prefer to think of us as mercenaries operating on IOU's. This hero crap, I don't care about it. As for Richard Sayre…" he punched the wall next to him, hard. "I'll break every bone he has, twice. Once for the boss and once for fun."

Tifa came to the last flower. A beautiful rose as red as blood sitting alone in the center of the flower patch. No other flower dared grow near, for no flower could even think to compare its beauty with this rose and any attempt would mar the very image of the rose itself.

Tifa gently poured the last of the jug's water around the rose. The church was filled with the sound of singing angels, despite Tifa being the only person in the building. Even the Turks standing outside the door could hear the choir swelling up in their ears. Their witty banter stopped and they could do nothing but listen to the sweet sounds of the rose. The voices sang beautiful high notes in supernatural keys and it invigorated the spirits and the minds of those who stopped to listen.

Tifa forced herself to pull away from the rose after a while. She left the church and looked at the two Turks. "That is why we have to protect that rose. Auron said it was the key to everything, and if you can't believe his words alone, just listen to the sound it makes. You two heard it too, I know you did. If you ever forget what you're fighting for, remember the rose."

The Turks and Tifa locked the doors of the Sector 5 church and began their long walk home.


	37. A4 Chapter 10

_Ka-tet – Path of the Beam_

The reunited ka-tet exited the castle through a back entrance and found themselves on a new road. The street was simple hardened dirt, unlike the ruined asphalt of the roads to the ruined castle. The road ran on in a straight line farther than they could tell. Almost at once, the ka-tet looked up to the sky and saw that they were once again standing underneath the beam. Satisfied with the day's events, they embarked on their journey to the Tower once more. The gunslinger walked on, his lips closed but his mind at work. He scratched the stubble on his face and tried to remember how long he had been on his journey for the Tower.

Link brushed his bangs out of his face. They had grown long during his time in Mid-World, although one could hardly call it that anymore. As the ka-tet walked on, the world continued to change around them. The Tower was continuing to weaken and the temporal rifts were becoming a normality in some parts of the world. Pieces of lost worlds fused and meshed, curtains of Twilight expanded, and throughout all of this, Randall Flagg laughed upon his throne in admiration.

From where he sat, he could see over a realm of the world that had been plunged into darkness and chaos. The rift was a pit of darkness, adorned with brilliant scars of lightning and beams of white energy. He held out his hand as if manipulating a puppet. "See boys, that is precisely where Midgar will go. The rose will be delivered to my doorstep on its last breath. After I take that too, the Tower will fall and we will absorb all that has ever existed and become gods. Doesn't that sound swell?" Flagg threw back his head and laughed. That was what he did, he laughed during times of chaos and misery. Flagg was the nightmare you woke up from, screaming and sweating. Flagg was the darkness in everyone's heart, whispering evil and begging to be unleashed.

Almost terrifying to think that there was actually something _more _terrifying than Flagg. Flagg did answer to one being, the most powerful, insane creature the universe has ever seen. The Crimson King watched and waited from his own place at the end of the world, waiting for Flagg to bring the Tower down.

Untold miles away, the ka-tet marched on. They knew little of the Crimson King or of Flagg's char-tet's true intentions, but they did feel that resonating feeling of justice. The feeling that they had to stop the King's plans, and not just for themselves. They hit the big leagues, these heroes that had been used to saving their own worlds. Because they weren't fighting for their own worlds anymore, but for all of them.

* * *

**AN: **That, dearest reader, marks the end of Arc Four. Thank you for sticking around to hear my story, I'll be back before you know it. Travel well, friends. -Dylan Kennedy


	38. Arc Five Chapter 1

**AN: **Just when I think I'm ready for a break, the song plays once more. This story isn't ready to rest yet, and so, I shall continue to tell you the tale. This Arc will follow more closely to the DT series than Arc Four, and the DT book it will follow is called _Wolves of the Calla _by (you guessed it) Stephen King. I hope you enjoy what I have in store for you.

* * *

_Old Man – Calla Bryn Sturgis_

The old man's lips turned down into a frown. He removed the cigarette from his mouth, blew smoke into the late afternoon air, and sighed deeply.

"The world…has changed," he said. No one was around to listen, the townsfolk were about their dinners and their end-of-the-day chores and no one had time to visit with the one they called "Old Traveler" at the moment.

So he sat alone on the porch of the small house the townsfolk had lent him, smoking a cigarette and reflecting on things. "The world has changed. It's no longer the place I once knew. No longer the future I had fought to protect. It's an ever-mutating land of rifts, brought about by some guy with a very dark chip on his shoulder."

He took another drag and blew the smoke out of his mouth – never out of his nose. "The world, and all of its people, have been lost to small black creatures more terrifying than anything I had ever faced."

The old man dropped the remainder of his cigarette onto the porch and snuffed it out with a single step and twist of his foot.

"The world has changed."

He rose from his seat in the old rocker and scanned the terrain. Rice fields all around, potato patches here and there, and corn way off to the west. But mostly rice. He dragged a hand over his mouth, straightening the hairs of his grey moustache. Grey was the word to describe him entirely. His eyes, his hair, the bandana wrapped around his head, and his morals – grey. The fight for good versus evil had ended, and when it did, the world was filled with light. The shadows, like himself, were to be erased. He was okay with that, he just wanted to see out the old and catch a glimpse of the new.

But the real shadows showed up and changed that plan. He had no choice but to watch from the safety of an airplane called the _Nomad_. Then the shadows swallowed that too. For an unknown amount of time, all he could remember was darkness. Nothing but empty space. He heard screams of things that dwelled only in nightmares, but saw nothing. He felt cold fingers slide across him, fingers trying to pull him under, but he had resisted. His strong will was the only thing that kept the darkness at bay, and his will was what brought him through the door into the Cave of Voices.

He was thrown through the door onto the dust and dirt of the cave, hearing voices call from the depths beyond the door. _"The blood of the east flows within your veins."_

The old man rose to his feet quickly. The cords of his musclesuit reacted to his panic and they tightened. Another voice rose from the depths, _"We're not men…we're shadows in the shape of men!" _The old man knew these voices, they were from foes in a past he couldn't escape. A past that repeated itself time and time over until the end of the world. And now they were coming back to haunt him again.

"_Hello dearest brother! You see, Snake? You can't protect anyone, not even yourself!"_

Solid Snake – that was the name he had once held. In his declining years, they had called him Old Snake. In truth, he was only 42 years old, but one look at him would make you guess somewhere in the sixties or even seventies. His face was riddled with wrinkles, his skin covered in liver spots, and the gravelly voice he carried in youth had become harsh and almost whispery at times.

Snake left the cave, wishing to hear no more of his past. When he came into the sunlight, he collapsed. The ordeal would be hard on anyone, let alone a man dying of rapid aging brought upon by his manipulated genetics. The strain was too much and down he went, another snake still in the dust.

Now he stood, not in his musclesuit but in a cotton tee shirt and blue jeans, looking out across the land he was forced to call "home." Accepting life on another world was hard, accepting it alone was the kicker. Whatever darkness he had been through to get to that door had apparently been too much for the few he called family. That was four months ago.

One of the townspeople approached him. A solemn-looking farmer, no older than thirty five. What was his name? Damn memory's fading, that's just great.

He held out a feather to Snake. "Meeting in two hours. Will you attend, old traveler?"

Snake grunted and patted the dust from his jeans. "Yeah, sure. I'll be there." The man turned and left without another word.

The meeting hall was packed with people. Even the big farmers that only came into town to sell their crop showed up, Wayne Overholser among them. Overholser was _the _big farmer in Calla Bryn Sturgis, and if this meeting was important enough for him to show up, the rest of the town had no choice but to listen.

The man who had come around with the feather took the stage at the front of the hall. The feather was still clasped in his hands and he waited a moment before speaking, making sure the majority of the room had eyes on him.

"Hear me, and hear me well! My name is Tian Jaffords and we have ourselves a problem. I know many of you would rather pretend that it doesn't exist, but we need to stop running."

The people in the crowd whispered to each other. Some rolled their eyes, others sighed and grabbed their foreheads in frustration. Tian continued, "The Wolves have been coming to the Callas for longer than any of us can remember now, my own da even saw them when he was young. If we don't do something, they'll keep doing what they've always done. Are we going to let them ride into town with their fire sticks and exploding sneetches, killing anyone who refuses to give up their children?"

One of the farmers in the back stood up. "And if we resist, they'll burn the town and _still _take our children. Only the twins, so you're still in the green with one of yours, aren't you Tian?"

It was true, the monsters they called Wolves only abducted twins. Unfortunately, the town was full of them. Twins were the norm, singletons were the exception. Tian himself had two sets of twins and a newborn singleton. How terrible it must be for the children that get taken by the metal riders on grey horses, taken off to a train that sends them straight into Hell's ugly cousin – Thunderclap. A place filled with radiation where they did something to the children, something terrible. After a few months, the children would return mutated and hideous. They grew three times the size of a normal human, their brains reverting back to the state of a small child. None of them lived over thirty, they grew right out of their own skin and died from the pain.

"You're going to let them take more children and return them huge and roont? I won't stand for it anymore!" Tian shouted. Some of the room met this with boot-stamping on the floor and applause. The thunderous tapping of the boots drowned out the few farmers that spoke against Tian. Sensing the roll he was on, Tian continued to shout.

"We'll make a stand! I'd rather die than stand by and watch my children get roont like my dear sister!"

Wayne Overholser hauled his considerable belly up and the room became silent. "So what do you suppose we do, then? How will we fight the Wolves when no one has ever managed to kill one?"

Tian looked down at the ground for a second, gathering his thoughts. He could hear more whispering in the crowd. Overholser had taken blind courage and replaced it with the most powerful emotion. Fear. Fear was hard to fight in a crowd of unsure people.

"Andy says we've got about a month before the Wolves come. He's never been wrong about this before, so we at least have that to work with."

One of the townspeople snorted. "To hell with that damn robot! Nothing but trouble!"

Tian glared at him. "Andy has served this town for generations. He's babysat our children and helped in times of need. You can't say he hasn't been a help, even if he is annoying with his horoscopes."

Snake entered the meeting hall and leaned against the back wall. The fate of this town was sad, sure enough, but he was too damn old to fight someone else's battle anymore. Besides, whatever these "Wolves" were, they sounded tough. The only things he still had was his musclesuit and his Springfield Operator. Hardly enough equipment to battle monsters.

Snake heard a clicking noise and turned his head. A grimy metal robot had entered the meeting hall and began to approach the front stage. He was tall, standing at about six feet, with bright blue LED lights for eyes. The name plate on his chest read "Andy – Messenger Robot and Many other Functions." Underneath the words "ShinRa Corporation" could be found. Andy stood in front of the stage and faced the crowd.

"I'm terribly afraid to interrupt, but I've got some good news and some bad news that I thought might be interesting," he said. His voice sounded false and pompous, like a prissy English butler. "It's about the Wolves."

Tian made a circle with his hand. "Well come on, tell us Andy. The good news first."

Andy's eyes flashed a few times. "The Wolves will not be coming to Thunderclap."

The room was silent. No one could believe the robot's words. Tian almost choked asking the other question, "What's the bad news then?"

"The Wolves have been replaced with something else. They're four times taller than a man with big black legs and metal bodies attached to a central metal spine. They are called 'Gekko'."

Snake felt his guts drop down into his feet. "Metal Gear…?" he mumbled under his breath.

"What are we supposed to do now Tian? How can we fight these Gekko things? We've never even seen one!"

Tian looked down at Andy. "Andy, how do you know all of this?"

The false politeness left the robot. "Information is classified. Password required."

Tian rolled his eyes. There were some things Andy flat out refused to tell people, he always did this password thing when those kind of questions were asked. Nobody had ever guessed the password correctly and so the information remained sealed off. Still, he was a robot. There was nothing to gain from lying, right?

Andy's voice returned back to its normal tone. "There is another piece of information that I thought I should share. Outsiders from the West are approaching town along the path of the beam. At their current speed, they will arrive in town within the week. One more thing: they appear to be gunslingers."

More whispers throughout the room. Some of the farmers scoffed and left the meeting, unamused with the robot's joke. Everyone knows that Gilead had fallen over a hundred years ago. There were no more gunslingers, just a fact.

Tian grabbed the robot's arm. "You're sure they're gunslingers?" The robot's eyes flashed a dozen times and he nodded.

Tian climbed back onto the stage. "I'm going to ride out of town to meet these people. If Andy's right and they are indeed gunslingers, they might be able to help us. Who will take a chance and join me? If you let this chance slide, we might be faced with something even worse than the Wolves."

Snake waved a hand. "I'll go, beats sitting around. Might as well make myself useful." Tian gave him a small grin, he liked the old traveler. He had that presence of an old fighter, someone used to getting things done that other people didn't want to deal with. Tian felt safe with the old man's company. Surprisingly enough, one of the few remaining farmers held his hand up.

"I'll go, but I want you to know that I still think we're making a mistake here," said Wayne Overholser.


	39. A5 Chapter 2

_Ka-tet – Path of the Beam_

Roland knew they were being followed before the others suspected anything. He began to hear voices on the wind in the middle of the night, tingling sensations in the back of his neck while they walked, all the little signs a mind picks up that equate to one simple truth:

_I'm being watched._

But he felt that telling the others would only cause confusion, so he kept his mouth shut. Besides, whoever was following them couldn't be that awful after all. If they meant ill will, they could have easily approached in the night with assassination attempts on the mind. They might have succeeded in the beginning too, before the gunslinger's sharp senses could pick up their presence.

Of course, there was another who knew. Not that he could inform the others, but he knew just as well as Roland did. Nanaki smelled the sweat of humans, unfamiliar ones at that. They smelled like rice and corn and they spoke with strange accents. He wanted to tell Alucard, but the dhampir never transformed into the only state he would be able to communicate in.

And so this went on for a week before another full moon came out to play. Alucard's powers sharpened with the moon was bright, and so he too began to hear voices in the night. He brought this up during a campfire dinner of small game animal and local herbs.

"How long has it been?" he asked the gunslinger, looking straight into Roland's cold blue eye. There might only be one left, but that eye was sharp and icy, a bombardier's eye. None of the others seemed to know the subject of the conversation.

Roland took a bite of his burrito and wiped his mouth. "Four days," he lied. A single word followed him on the night wind, the whole ka-tet heard it.

"_-Gunslingers?"_

Link looked around and spoke with a mouth full of burrito, "You guys just heard that too, right? Someone said something and it wasn't any of us."

"I heard it, someone said 'gunslingers'," said Cloud. The fire reflected in his Mako eyes, giving them a spectral sparkle. Cloud felt the ground next to him, running his fingers along the edge of the Buster Sword. He wouldn't hesitate to use it if those voices turned out to be from unpleasant mouths.

"What are we going to do Roland? What's your plan?" asked Alucard.

"Nothing. We act as if we're still ignorant to their existence. They'll approach us when they're good and ready." The gunslinger closed his eye, laid down on his back, and said no more. The others stayed up for small talk into another few hours of the night.

When the fire was low and tired, so became the ka-tet. They all drifted into deep sleep that night, including the gunslinger himself. Deeper than they would have liked, that was certain.

That was the night they went Todash.

* * *

Cloud opened his eyes, expecting to see the path of the beam. Instead, he saw something that made his eyes well up with tears.

He saw Midgar. He was home.

The sunlight was dim that day, but that didn't bother Cloud. He appreciated how it didn't sear into his eyeballs. A look around told him he was in Sector 5, only a few blocks away from the place he wanted to be most.

He was about to make his way towards Tifa's 7th Heaven when he heard two sharp barks and the cry of a young boy. Link stood on the corner across the street with Nanaki at his side, frantically waving his arms at Cloud.

"_HEY! CLOUD!"_

Cloud waved back, giving the boy a big smile. "Come across, I don't see any cars around!" Link and the wolf ran across the street to meet Cloud. Link couldn't stop looking around, his eyes big with discovery and wonder.

"First time in a big city, huh? After I say hi to Tifa, I'll give you a tour…" his voice trailed off as he came to a sad realization.

There was no way this could be real. He fell asleep in Roland's world, so how was it that he was back in his own? Sure, everything felt pretty much the same. Something was off, he couldn't quite place it, but this was definitely Midgar. So it had to be a dream then, right?

"Link, are you real?" he asked.

Link blinked at him twice in rapid succession. "I was thinking about asking you the same thing. I'm as real as you are, I guess?"

So there it was then. This wasn't exactly a dream if Link was real too. This was different, an out of body experience or something like that. "I have no idea what's going on, but I think I'd like to go home and see Tifa if she's there," said Cloud.

Link shrugged. "I don't know what's going on either, but I'll stay with you. Let's go."

They walked to the bar, finding two more familiar faces inside. Roland was behind the counter, pouring himself a drink of whiskey. Alucard sat in the corner, his eyes red and strained.

"You alright?" asked Cloud. Alucard glared at him.

"No, something is really off and it's getting to me. My head feels tense and my muscles are weak. I feel like I'm trapped in a dark box."

Roland slammed his shot of whiskey and turned to the dhampir. "That's because this isn't reality or a dream. This hasn't happened to me since I was a young man, but I can say for certain that we've gone Todash."

The others stared blankly.

"Our bodies are mostly here in wherever this place is. From the stories you've told us Cloud, I'm assuming this is your home of Midgar. Am I correct?"

Cloud nodded to the gunslinger. "Yeah, this is definitely Midgar. But how are we here?"

Roland shook his head and poured another shot. "It's hard to say what exactly sent us Todash. Certain plants are capable, but this is a powerful state we're in. We had to have been sent here by powers greater than we can currently understand. This is the work of magic, and judging by the darkness I know you're all feeling, black magic at that."

As soon as he said that, they all began to understand. That feeling that something was just _off _was darkness. The sun was out, but dim. A blanket of darkness lay at the corners of everything as if they were seeing the world through tinted glass.

Link sat down as Cloud rushed down the hall, calling for Tifa. "You said you've gone Todash before, what sent you last time?"

Roland took a deep breath and exhaled slowly through his nostrils. "Remember when I told you about my time in Mejis? My time with Cuthbert, Alain, and dear Susan? We took a magical artifact from the witch, if you remember. One of the Wizard's Rainbow – glass balls with the power to see. What they saw varied, but I was sent Todash by the grapefruit, which was the Pink ball. The grapefruit saw acts of jealousy and cruelty, and so I saw many things which I regret seeing."

He couldn't bring himself to mention the worst of these things, which was the burning of Gilead and the death of his friend Alain.

Cloud came back into the bar. "She's here but she won't answer me. I tried to touch her arm and I…I…"

"You went through her." Roland said, a statement, not a question.

"How did you know?"

"He's done this before," answered Alucard. The dhampir tried to stand up but ended up stumbling to the floor. Evidently, the darkness was putting a strain on his energy.

Roland and Cloud helped him to his feet. Tifa came into the bar, taking her usual place behind the counter.

"Tifa…" said Cloud. His eyes began to tear up again, but these tears certainly weren't of homesick joy.

Tifa sighed and rubbed her bulging belly. The baby inside had grown, she was well along in kindling Cloud's child. He reached out to her, and for a second, it looked like her eyes had moved over to see him.

But then his hand fell away and so did her gaze. The ka-tet left the bar, walking through the door without opening it. Tifa felt something, a certain warmth, leave the room.

"I could almost smell him…that was strange. I hope he's okay," she said, mindlessly cleaning Roland's empty shotglass. It never crossed her mind that someone must have entered the bar and taken a drink without paying.


	40. A5 Chapter 3

_Ka-tet - Todash Midgar_

Cloud walked on with his head hanging low. The darkness was all around them now, they could feel its presence more clearly than before.

Roland stopped walking and looked around. "Something sent us here, and I think I might know what did. I have a feeling that this is the doing of Flagg."

Alucard tossed a stick. "What makes you say that?"

"I mentioned earlier that I've gone todash before. I was sent by an ancient magical artifact we referred to as 'the grapefruit'. It was a pink crystal ball, forged along with twelve other colored glass balls by the wizard Maerlyn himself. They would come to be known as "Maerlyn's Rainbow" in many legends. They each had the power to see things, be it past, present, or future. Unfortunately, the power of these crystal balls caused great madness and addiction in those who used them."

The gunslinger took a deep breath and exhaled slowly. "I was affected as well, and the ball would send my weakening mind and body todash quite frequently. Based on what we have experienced so far, I would say that we are without a doubt in the same state. But the grapefruit that plagued me is nothing compared to what sent us here, if my fears are indeed true."

Link held up his hands. "If it's just another part of the Rainbow, then what makes it so much worse?"

"Because," said Roland as he took out a cigarette. "Black Thirteen is the most powerful and sinister of them all."

* * *

Three pairs of boots clacked against the hard dirt of the road. The air around their owners tightened and warped. The char-tet were miles ahead of the ka-tet, far past the town of Calla Brynn Sturgis. Randall Flagg, wearing jeans and a denim jacket with a bloodied smiley face attached to it, walked in the middle. The King of Evil on his left, the One Winged Angel on his right.

"Why do we have to walk, we could easily open a portal at any time," grumbled Ganondorf. Flagg stopped walking, placed a hand on his shoulder, and gave his wide creepy smile.

"The White's fools are too close for us to risk detection. You continue to underestimate your adversary's powers, even if he is just a boy. He's bested you many times, and he's even more powerful now than he was before. Being with the gunslinger has given him the Touch, and if we open a portal or so much as cast a curse at this distance, he'll pick up on it."

Flagg sent a small charge of electricity through his hand into Ganondorf's shoulder. The King of Evil made a small groan of pain and tensed under the burn. Flagg stopped and withdrew his hand.

"So we walk, _king. _Hee hee hee!" Flagg jumped and clicked his heels, tittering as he started a slow near-skip down the road.

* * *

Back in Todash Midgar, the ka-tet stood in the ruins leading up to the abandoned church. Cloud had suggested that they pay it a visit, maybe try to see if they could actually take his materia stash back with them.

As they approached the church, Link began to hear a faint noise. It sounded like humming, but as they got closer, it became singing. The rest of the ka-tet heard it too by the time they arrived at the great wooden doors.

"Something's changed. You guys hear that…singing?" said Cloud. The others nodded and when Cloud opened the door, they understood everything.

In the middle of Cloud's flower garden lie the rose, the same one that Tifa had ordered the ex-Turks to defend not even three hours prior. The voices multiplied as they walked towards the rose. Ten became twenty, twenty became two hundred, and two hundred became two thousand. They gaped in awe it the beauty of the rose, their eyes bulging with pure admiration as the rose unfolded its pedals and revealed the bright ball of light at its center.

"The sun of this world. No, of _all _worlds…" the gunslinger whispered, unaware that he was thinking aloud. They kneeled in a circle around the rose and sat silently, appreciating the divine power before them. The rose was the deepest red any of them had ever seen, with a small splash of purple on one of the pedals.

Alucard forcibly turned his head away so he could speak, "This rose is…clearly important to our cause. But we have to get out of here, I've been sensing something evil since we appeared and I don't want to lead it here."

Roland knew the rose was connected to the Tower. The more he thought about it, the more he became hooked on the idea that this rose _was _the Tower. An avatar of it for this world, this level. If the rose met an ill fate, surely the Tower would suffer.

Roland rose to his knees, wincing as they cracked like gunshots, and made circle motions with his hand. "Alucard is right. This rose must never be harmed, but we need to leave. Grab your material Cloud so we can leave."

Cloud was tempted to correct Roland's mispronunciation when a few gunshots from outside the church stopped him. The ka-tet quickly moved to the doors; the rose folded its pedals. Reno and Rude stood opposite two ShinRa First Class SOLDIERs in the dirt.

"We have authorization from President Sayre to search this property, step aside traitors," said the first one.

"Yeah, just be thankful we aren't arresting you for _treason_," said the second, cracking his knuckles.

Reno and Rude turned and looked at each other silently. A moment passed, then they began to bellow laughter. Reno pointed a finger at the first SOLDIER. "You call _us _traitors? Your "president" killed the rightful owner of the _ShinRa _company, you know, _Rufus Shinra_."

Rude cracked his neck. "Beat it, before I beat your faces in so bad that your own mothers won't recognize you."

The first SOLDIER clicked open the first clasp holding his rifle to his back. "Even if you kill us, they'll be wondering why two SOLDIERS went missing suddenly. They'll send a strike team out here within two hours and then even the infamous Turks will have their hands full."

Reno looked around him and shrugged. "SOLDIERs go missing all the time, what with the rebels stepping their game up lately. Do you really think your commander cares about a little chickenshit scout like you? Make my day, kiddo." Reno drew his stun baton and waved his arm out in a taunt.

The two SOLDIERs rushed in, crossing through each other's paths. Reno caught the bayonet of SOLDIER One's rifle, casting it aside with a parry. He threw his hand out above his foe's head, causing the enemy to look up for a possible attack. The deception hit hard, and Reno's kidney punch hit even harder. The goon hit the dust and took a face full of stun rod. He screamed out, "RIVERS, HELP ME!" as Reno rained blows upon him.

Rude was engaged in close-quarters melee combat with SOLDIER Rivers. Rivers landed a right cross on Rude, sending the ex-Turk's glasses skittering across the dirt. Rude took another pair out of his sports coat pocket, put them on, and grappled Rivers. Rude threw his weight, bringing them down to the dust. Rude got in full mount and punched Rivers' nose until blood covered his knuckles. With the scout dazed, he twisted his arm up and dropped: Rude had him in an arm bar. The scout wailed until he ran out of breath, falling unconscious.

"Glad they're on our side," said Alucard. "They seem to know what we're doing, so at least we know this place is safe."

"For now." Roland drew one of his revolvers, twirled it around a few times, and dropped it back in his holster. All around them, the air began to feel heavy.

Link groaned. "What's happening? Augh, my head hurts!" A terrible nosie silenced the dull roar of the rose's choir and replaced it with out-of-tune chimes louder than a Metallica concert.

The gunslinger shouted as loud as he could so the others could hear him, "_THESE ARE THE CHIMES! EVERYBODY GRAB HANDS, LINK HOLD ONTO NANAKI!"_

They did as they were told just before the whole world seemed to tear apart. The world became nothing but black, and the chimes ceased.


End file.
